Jinchuuriki
by Sapphire X Dreams
Summary: Bijuu- they have power to create or destroy. When all nine Jinchuuriki come together, you can ensure chaos. But if the Akatsuki come together to capture them, you can ensure national turmoil.
1. Complete: Invasion

_**Disclaimer: I do NOT own Naruto or any of the other jinchuuriki. The only jinchuuriki I own are the ones I created lives, names, and techniques for. (Gouta, Rikuto, Shuuko, and Ritsuki) **_

_Note: I have seen the picture in manga chapter 420, from that, I have created techniques, names, and personalities for the unknown jinchuuriki. For the bijuu, I have used a Naruto forum, I have edited a few of the animals to fit the Jinchuuriki's appearance. (Such as, I made the Rokubi a weasel **isopod**, because Ritsuki blows bubbles. That might have something to do with a water jutsu). __Masashi Kishimoto (creator of Naruto) hasn't released the names of all of the Jinchuuriki yet, so for now I will be making up names and techniques from the information I have now. So please, if my readers get any new information about the Jinchuuriki and it's not the same as my characters, please forgive me for that. So anyway, please enjoy the story and __**THERE ARE GOING TO BE SOME SPOILERS. **__(it depends on what point in the manga you are at) _**THIS CHAPTER IS NOT VERY IMPORTANT! YOU MAY SKIP IT IF YOU CHOOSE!**

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* * *

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_Chapter One: Complete: Invasion_

_From the time we were 'discovered' and to the time of our death,_

_we were always known as weapons for our village people's disposal._

_Our fellow villagers wished the worst for us, and wouldn't even look at us._

_They will never know the pain we feel..._

_In our hearts....._

A Sharingan eye looked down over the village of Konoha. The person stood in the shadows of the trees overlooking the sleeping and currently peaceful village. They looked like idiots just sleeping without a care in their mind's right before their village was to be attacked.

The Sharingan user looked over at the Hokage's office building that was practically hidden in the darkness. No lights were on inside.

A grin crept over the man with the Sharingan's face. The village he once called home was going to be in a complete panic some people running in fear and some idiots staying to fight.

What was on his mind though, was how they were going to stop the terrible creature from completely destroying the village.

He decided not to hold off any longer. After performing a few hand signs and pressing his blood covered hand in the middle of the village, an enormous beast came out of nowhere.

The village's lights were rapidly turning on in hearing the loud roar of a large, red Kitsune with nine tails swinging around in the air rapidly.

The Sharingan user made another hand seal and then in an instant, was gone from the village leaving what he left.

Under the many legs of the Kitsune, was the bloody seal that he left to make the Kitsune appear. The words Seal were left.

"Finally. I'm free from my prison." The kitsune growled. In seconds, it caught sight of many people running out of their houses to see the commotion.

The kitsune roared and then prepared to kill off everyone in the entire village.

"Where is Hokage-sama?!" The village people yelled out. It had been five days since the kitsune had arrived in the village.

Over 5,000 shinobi were killed and most of them were lying on the ground of the village, blood spilling out from them.

The ones who remained standing, were injured terribly. That current night marked the fifth day of the attack of the Kyuubi of which it was called.

Just then, a loud scream echoed throughout the village. "Hokage-sama!" All eyes (including the Kyuubi's) turned towards a giant toad that the blond ruler stood on.

"Hokage-sama! He's going to rescue us all!!" the voices of the village people called in delight. What most of them didn't know, was that he was going to die doing so.

A large flash of light covered the entire village as the Kyuubi was slowly being pulled away.

When everyone looked up again, they saw the fourth Hokage dead and they saw a crying baby in a bundle on the ground.

The third Hokage had heard about the baby and took him into his office. It would be very difficult for him to grow up under the eyes of the people who would soon come to despise and hate him.

* * *

Off in Sunagakure, the village was also in destruction as well. A rather loud-mouthed Bijuu was making a racket in the village with its screaming of finally being freed.

"You need to seal the Shukaku into the child of Karura." Yondaime Kazekage replied to a woman standing in the office.

"But, he's still an unborn child." The woman said. Her name was revealed to be Chiyo.

"The child is a tool to protect the village. The baby will be killed a while after its birth." Chiyo nodded at the orders and then headed out to seal the Shukaku.

Once she was face-to-face with the beast, after performing a few hand signs, the beast was sealed into the unborn child of the Kazekage.

* * *

On a perfectly pretty evening, a two tailed cat attacked the Cloud Village. A small child was rushed to the scene and the cat was quickly sealed into it.

* * *

In the Village of the Hidden Mist, a large three-tailed turtle-like creature loomed from the water.

* * *

Another child was brought to the ocean and another Bijuu was sealed saving the village.

* * *

In the Earth country, two bijuu were attacking the village. One with four tails and the other with five.

For a while, it was thought that both could be sealed inside one child but that wouldn't do.

Two children were brought. One was one and the other had turned three a month ago.

The five tails was sealed into the one-year old and the four tails inside the other child.

The Rock Village was saved from the destruction, but was rather messed up from all of the commotion of two Bijuu.

* * *

In the Hot Spring village, a six tailed beast was sealed into another child.

* * *

And in the Waterfall village, another Bijuu was sealed.

* * *

Again from the Cloud Village a while later, there was another Bijuu attacking. This time, an eight tailed one.

It was quickly sealed after much bloodshed.

* * *

Finally, when all of the Bijuu had been sealed into Jinchuuriki, it seemed as if all of the villages were tired out completely.

Nine Bijuu were sealed into Nine different people.

Those Nine different people would lead nine different lives and carry nine different dreams.

Those nine people were all different, but in one respect they were the same.

They were brought together by one word....

_Jinchuuriki_

**Authors Note: Kind of a repeat of the same thing, but I sort of had to introduce all that stuff or else the chapter would probably be terribly short. The story gets a lot better from here. **


	2. Jinchuuriki

_Chapter Two: Jinchuuriki_

"Ha, ha, ha!" A loud laugh bellowed out of the girl's mouth as she ran. "Morashita-sensei will never catch me! He probably doesn't even notice that I'm playing hooky!" A girl with the appearance of a twelve-year-old ran into a dark alley and hid behind a bunch of trash cans, her hand clasped tightly.

The girl had light green hair and reddish-pink eyes. She opened her hand as she crouched down behind a trash can. Inside her hands was a Waterfall Village headband. The metal shone brightly in the sun.

"I deserve this." The girl whispered to herself. The volume of her voice rose a little too loud. "Morashita-sensei's just not giving me this because I'm one of those stupid things, called a... a... Jinchuuriki!"

She rose to her feet with a smug look on her face and her arms crossed. "Hmph." The green-haired girl was walking out from behind the garbage cans when something hard hit her face.

She fell backwards and the same thing that had hit her, fell onto her lap. She discovered that it was a rock. Immediately, she felt a wet liquid on her face. She knew instantly that it was blood. Looking up again, she saw a group of children younger than her, some adults were with them. They were all armed with rocks.

"**GO DIE SOMEWHERE, JINCHUURIKI-FREAK!!**" A young child yelled. Then, a shower of rocks began flying through the air at the girl. She tried her best to cover herself with her arms but the rocks hit her arms and she landed on the ground still being pelting in the face and head.

All of a sudden, the rock attack stopped. She heard that they were hitting something else. A shadow fell over her, and to her surprise, she saw a familiar man with a mustache hovering above her.

"Morashita-sensei!"The girl gasped. The girl looked behind her sensei and discovered that her group of attackers had scattered.

"This is why you are NOT to run off and play hooky!" The man hissed turning to her with a look that made her stomach churn, uneasily. He bent down and snatched the headband out of her hand.

"You are NOT to touch this again until you actually _earn_ it." He said to her, standing up.

"Let's go." Morashita replied, ignoring the blood and bruises on her face. However, the girl brought the situation up anyway.

"But... what about my face? It hurts like crazy." The scarlet-eyed girl replied. She finally struggled to her feet after pressing on her hands. "We'll check it out when we get back." Morashita replied without even turning to her.

As the two walked, the girl finally spoke after a long while of silence.

"Why does everyone treat me like this?" The girls' head bowed low. It was a long while until Morashita answered.

"It's because you're a monster." He said, again without even looking at her. The words rang through her head and she felt so close to tears. Instead, she gripped her fist and bit her lip.

"Why can't people see past that?!" The girl replied running up to the man to catch up.

"I'm not a monster! I'm a human being too!" her voice trailed off. "And one day... everyone will remember my name. They will remember my name so much that they won't go a day without saying 'Shuuko!'" The girl now know as 'Shuuko' yelled with her hands up in the air.

* * *

Elsewhere, a ninja was training in the forest. He looked around fifteen or so. He was practicing with both of his arms tied behind his back as he kicked a tree stump.

_"One hundred ten, one hundred eleven, one hundred twelve..."_ The boy told himself as he kicked the tree.

Finally he got to two hundred and switches legs. But with his other leg, he only gets to twenty-three before falling to the ground in a fit of panting. Beads of sweat fall from his forehead. "Why is this so hard?!" The boy half yelled before getting himself up with his feet since his arms were still tied.

He shook his head in frustration and soon, bubbles of chakra began to escape and appear all around him. His face began turning fierce and the pupils of his eyes disappear.

In the trees above, a few shinobi stand watching him. "He's the last of them," one of shinobi whisper. "After he's gone... the entire clan will be finished...." The one talking grinned to himself and removed a bow and arrow from behind his back.

Pulling the arrow steady, he finally shoots the arrow, but the boy turns around to see the arrow coming, and it slashes sideways through his mouth. The boy attacks already in his Bijuu's form. From his mouth comes out a lightning ball as well as a fire ball.

The bursts of elements hit the tree knocking a few shinobi from them. Falling from the tree, there are twelve shinobi with bows and arrows. At the same time, they all shoot. Over thirty-five arrows with explosive tags fly out and hit the jinchuuriki everywhere. Suddenly, they all explode loudly.

Blood splatters the ground, and most of the jinchuuriki's skin is peeled off.

After roaring in pain, the jinchuuriki finally snaps out of his Bijuu state and falls to the ground bleeding profusely. The twelve ninja scatter through the trees and leave the jinchuuriki to bleed himself to death.

After a few seconds of bleeding the jinchuuriki gets up and hurries off to his household seeing his family is waiting for him there, already dead.

He walks into his home and unties his arms from the half exploded rope. He then looks over his wounds seeing dozens of bruises, scars, and ripped skin. After he stops the bleeding, but the ugly scars and scabs still scattering his body.

Looking in a mirror, he sees the large red line cutting through his mouth. He finds heavy clothing and covers himself in it and also finds a mask. After dressing in his new attire, he places on his Rock Village headband and then goes back out to continue training.


	3. Blood and Water

_Chapter Three: Blood and Water_

It was on an evening when the sun was slowly sinking below the horizon. A sunset over Kirigakure. In the great waters of Kirigakure, a lime-haired boy swims. At first glance, you can tell he's was a very skilled swimmer; he's able to do multiple flips and turns under the water without any hesitation.

The boy had lavender-colored eyes and a long zipper-like scar under his right eye. That, is his Bijuu's mark. After taking in a large breath, the Jinchuuriki of the three-tailed Sanbi goes back underwater.

**"Child, you should be training, not swimming circles around a pool. Stupid fool!"** The Sanbi yelled from inside the stomach of the child.

"My name is not child, it's Rikuto. You're being very rude. Don't talk unless your spoken too, stupid Bijuu." The child, now named Rikuto, snapped at the Bijuu inside him.

Inside, the Bijuu glared out from its gate. **"Just you wait, you stupid brat. One day I will kill you from the inside out." **

* * *

In the Hot Spring Village, a bunch of bubbles soar across the entire village. People who travel the streets look up in annoyance at the bubbles, for they already knew where they were coming from.

Across the village, a black-haired boy blew bubbles from a bubble pipe. The strange boy was the jinchuuriki of the six-tailed weasel-isopod-like creature. It was called the 'Rokubi.'

The peculiar thing about this jinchuuriki though, was that it was rumored that he acted so emotionless because the Bijuu was sealed into his heart. The bubble-blower finally stood up and headed on his way, possibly to his home.

For years, he always came to that particular spot to blow bubbles. That was his favorite hobby for whoever knows why.

When the boy arrived at the door, his feet stopped. A corpse was on the ground beneath him. The boy stared at the body that was lying in a pile of blood. "So they were all killed..." His voice trailed off as he turned around and left the house as well as the bodies lying inside and out.

* * *

In Konoha and Sunagakure, the One and Nine tailed beasts were getting on great in their village. At least, the one from Konoha was. The one from Sunagakure was living a terribly dark life of living day after day, lusting for blood.

* * *

Off in Kumogakure, Yugito Nii and a child nicknamed 'Killer Bee' were living in different homes. Killer Bee was the Village's child poet. He had a habit of always speaking in rhymes.

Nii Yugito was a wimpy child, always left crying and running for her life from the angry people that detested her.

* * *

The last Jinchuuriki was the four-tailed one who also lived in the Rock Village. He was many years older than any of the other jinchuuriki.

All nine of the Jinchuuriki had never met each other. Until recently, Naruto met Gaara. But other than that, no one had met the others.

Yet.


	4. The Other Jinchuuriki

_Chapter Four: The Other Jinchuuriki_

Once Shuuko and Morashita arrived back at a large building, (the Waterfall Village academy) all eyes were on the two. A few children snickered as Shuuko walked by. "Looks like it didn't work, Shuuko." A child whispered cruelly. "Shut up!" Shuuko snapped and continued behind her sensei.

He lead her into the nurses' office. "Sit." He ordered pointing at the small bed that was there. Shuuko obeyed. He left the room shaking his head and sighing just as the nurse walked in. Next door to the nurse's office, there was one of the many Waterfall Village discussion centers for Waterfall Village officials. There was to be a meeting that day, but what Shuuko didn't know was that it was going on that very moment.

She let the nurse dab wet cloths on her bruises, silently cursing every time she felt pain. "Wait here." The nurse directed sounding rather unkind. She left the room leaving Shuuko on the bed, alone. That's how jinchuuriki always felt, alone.

Just then, the crimson-eyed girl heard voices. Outside the door, coming from the discussion room next door. Shuuko picked her head up and placed her ear on the wall. However, the words were way too vague. She crept over to the door and snuck out of the room.

Placing her ear on the door, she heard everything perfectly:

_**"I heard that the Hot Spring Village has a rather troublesome jinchuuriki. Most say that every night, in Bijuu form, he's been attacking the village. He's never let out all the tails, just one or two, but it's still suspicious and they should continue to keep their eyes on him. **_

_**"We're already having enough trouble with our own jinchuuriki," a voice replied. It sounded a lot like Morashita-sensei's. **_

_**"Oh yeah, I almost forgot. What was her name again?**_

_**"Who cares what her name is?!"**_

_**"Anyway, the Hot Spring Village want reinforcements or something to help them with this kid."**_

_**"Turn them down, we can't help them now."**_

_**"Fine, I just hope their village is okay with just a few ANBU members watching that beast." **_

_**"We should just be thankful that she hasn't let her Bijuu out yet." **_

_**"Yeah." **_

Shuuko's head lifted from the door. She dashed off back to the nurses office.

"So there are other ones like me! I've got to see this other jinchuuriki! We could have so much fun together and maybe we can find _even more_ jinchuuriki! Together." Shuuko replied, delighted at the thought.

* * *

Later that night, Shuuko quickly went to the Academy and stole something from one of the dark classrooms. Then, she went back to her house and got dressed into a new outfit.

A white shirt with a fishnets on the bottom, and a long, white skirt. She had white arm socks, and on her right arm, the stolen object.

A Waterfall Village headband.

It seemed to be covering something. Then, on her back, she had a rather large red bag holding a weapon inside. Looking over the village atop a branch, she took one last glance. "After I cross the border... I'll be a rogue ninja."

Ignoring that fact, she turned around and left the village.

* * *

It was early morning when she arrived at the very beautiful and peaceful village. There were people walking down the streets and many buildings. The mist from the early morning had already cleared and you could see every beautiful aspect of the village.

As soon as she came as far as to the middle of the village, was when she saw them. Many, many bubbles were soaring over the village. Looking up at the sky, Shuuko wore a questioning expression.

"Bubbles? Who could be blowing those?"

Following the direction in which they came, Shuuko came to an alley. There, the black-haired boy was blowing bubbles with his bubble pipe.

He had on a multicolored blue robe, some long pants and wooden sandals. His eyes were closed as he blew the bubbles and Shuuko quietly crept over to him. She looked closely at the instrument that the floating balls of liquid were coming from. Then she listened to hear the soft breathes that the boy made as the bubbles came from the pipe.

Curiously, she placed one finger onto the opening of the pipe blocking the bubbles from coming through. And instead of hearing soft breaths, she heard a short and loud elephant-sounding shriek. Water squirted out of the pipe crazily and the boy immediately opened his eyes to jump back in horror from the odd-looking girl in his face.

"Sorry for scaring you like that," Shuuko smiled innocently at him. "I was just wondering if you could help me find someone." The Waterfall Village headband on her arm caught his eye.

_'So she's a rogue ninja...' _

The boy rolled his eyes, stood up and began leaving the girl behind. She trailed on behind him. "As you can see on my headband, I'm from the Waterfall Village. I came here looking for a jinchuuriki."

The boy stopped abruptly staring ahead, wide eyed. Without another word, the boy disappeared into thin air. Shuuko looked around confused.

From a tree above her, the boy looked down at her.

_"So that's why she's here. She's not a rogue ninja, she's on a mission. The village would probably be overjoyed by her being here to kill me, so I can't bring her body to the Feudal Lord. I guess I should just drown her and destroy her body later." _


	5. Reluctance

_Chapter Five: Reluctance_

Ritsuki (Rokubi if you don't know by now) is still sitting atop the tree. He extends his right arm and then holds his wrist with his left arm. 

From the ground, a bubble begins to form around Shuuko. 

"What the-" Her sentence gets cut off from the bubble forming around her and trapping her underwater. 

"What the heck is this? Who could be doing this?"  

The Shichibi's (seven tails) chakra formed around Shuuko and the bubble burst in an instant. 

Ritsuki's eyes widened at the sight of that. 

"She's a Jinchuuriki.... too..."

Shuuko immediately turned back to normal. "What the heck is the big idea?!" Who did tha-" She cut herself off as she saw smaller bubbles from the larger one disperse in the air. 

"It was... that boy." She tightened her fist after coming out of her expeditious state of dumbfounded state. 

"Alright, come on out! I'm ready to fight if you are!!! I'm sick of people treating ME like a monster just because I'm a Jinchuuriki!!! So come on out here, I dare ya!!!!" 

Shuuko tightened both of her fists and began punching the air in front of her. 

Down from the tree and landing on his feet came Ritsuki. He stood up straight before her. Then, he placed one hand on his left shoulder and slid his robe down a little bit to reveal a large X that seemed to be made from a scratch. But the entire mark was all black. 

Shuuko's arms slowly fell to her sides as she looked at the mark on his mid-shoulder. That looked like a mark that Jinchuuriki wore. 

She lowered her eyes and then took the headband off of her right arm revealing something that looked like very long teeth marks on her arm, except they were black just like the mark on the Rokubi's shoulder.  

"This is the reason why I always wore long sleeves." Shuuko said basically just to break the ice. Then, she brightened and smiled at him. 

"So you're the Jinchuuriki that I heard about." He didn't answer but simply looked away. "I heard that there were 9 different Jinchuuriki. I've always longed to know the others and now I finally know one. That's the whole reason I ran away from my village." 

After a slow moment of silence, Shuuko spoke up again. "My name's Shuuko! What's yours?!" 

The boy didn't answer. 

"Okay... can I call you... Kanmoku?" (Kanmoku means 'keeping silent') 

The boy looked up at her and twitched at the name. 

"No."    

"Then what's your name?! Tell me!" Shuuko urged. 

"You're a rather annoying Jinchuuriki." The boy said rolling his eyes. 

"Thank you!" Shuuko giggled and grinned the big goofy smile she had had a while ago. 

"Ooh! I just had a great idea! Why don't you come with me to find the other Jinchuuriki?!" 

The boy stopped abruptly and turned around slowly to give her a rather icy stare. 

"No." 

"But why not?! You're a Jinchuuriki, I'm a Jinchuuriki! It would probably make you feel a lot better if you found more people suffering the same problem!"

The boy rolled his eyes and continued walking. 

"Also, you really need to tell me your name or I'll start calling you Kanmoku." Shuuko said still following closely behind him. 

"Ritsuki. That's my name. Happy now?" The boy snapped. "Very." Shuuko said smiling victoriously. The two stopped at a rather large pagoda looking house. "Is this where you live?" Shuuko replied looking up at the enormous house. 

Then she saw the splatters and slanders of blood on the walls. She gasped and then backed away from the house. "No way am I going to let you stay in that! You might be next to die!" She said and grabbed his arm pulling him off forcefully. 

Even though Ritsuki was still reluctant to go, he didn't at all struggle from her grasp. And as Shuuko packed up his stuff and pulled him along out of the Hot Spring Village, she kept the thought of the bloodthirsty demon that attacked the village every night in the furthest corner of her mind.  


	6. Blood Stained Dreams

_Chapter Six: Blood-Stained Dreams_

_Blood squirted out onto the walls of a dark house. They splattered onto the walls and dripped down the sides._ _Laughing bellowed throughout the entire house. Echoing over and over into eternity._

_"Alright kid." The creature's dark voice echoed into the halls. "You're next." The creature slowly opened it's bloodshot eyes._

_Although the creature was hidden in the shadows, but you could see the malicious toothy grin on his face. His sharp teeth spreading about into a smile._

_Slowly, the mouth of the creature opened as if to eat something, and then its teeth came onto something splattering blood onto the walls, floor, and on top of the bodies that covered the floor._

Ritsuki laid on the ground in the forest whimpering and crying softly to himself. Shuuko was sprawled out next to him. And soon the whimpering reached her ears. She woke up and saw Ritsuki shivering and whining. She began shaking him rapidly whispering hoarsely, "Ritsuki! Wake up!"

Ritsuki sprang up and began pantining and sweating looking around at the dark forest that the two were both in.

"What's wrong?" Shuuko asked giving him a serious look."Did you have a nightmare?"

Ritsuki shook his head and his expression immediately changed from scared to calm and serene again.

"It's nothing." Ritsuki said turning away from Shuuko. After awhile of staring, Shuuko went back to sleep. And once Ritsuki made sure her breaths were following a steady rhythm, he stood up and left the site.

The pearl moon shown down upon him as he walked to the river hidden behind trees and other plants.

The black-haired boy sat by the river and slid his hand through the cool and relaxing waters. He was lost in thought about the dream he had just had. For the past 2 weeks, he had been having dreams about slaughter and bloodshed. And then, he would always wake up to find himself in the middle of the village surrounded by bodies of people from Yugakure (the Hot Spring Village).

From rumors, he would always hear about the menace he was, and that he needed to be kept under some kind of watch or else his Bijuu would automatically take control and destroy the village. But this time was different. The Rokubi was aware that the Shichibi (a stronger Bijuu) was near.

Ritsuki sighed and shook his head. He was desperately tired. He and Shuuko had been traveling for an entire day, and now they were in some unknown country.

Suddenly, he heard something from the bushes and trees. An incredibly strong chakra was coming from whom ever was in there.

Taking a kunai out from his pouch, Ritsuki stood up ready to attack. Out from the trees came a large, partial tanned man with two tattoos. One on his cheek, the other on his arm.

He had strange light pale blonde hair and black sunglasses on his face. For a second, Ritsuki was dumbstruck seeing the man's deranged sense of style, but then got out of his faze.

"_I've never seen this kid before." _The man said. His headband had the Cloud Village's symbol on it. So that's where they were....

The man took out one of his sword's just as Ritsuki recognized the strange symbol on the man's face. They were bull horns.

Just as Ritsuki noticed, a sword was flung through the air heading straight for him. Ritsuki quickly dodged the sword, and retreated back to where Shuuko was.

Still rather calmly, (but definitely annoyed) he began shaking the green-haired girl rather quickly to wake her.

"Five more... minutes..." The girl mumbled in her sleep, but just at that very moment, another sword surged from the trees.

"Get up we're underattack!" Ritsuki called still shaking the girl. But then he picked her up and moved her from the sword's attack.

Another sword came surging through the trees once more, and this time, it hit Ritsuki in his left shoulder. He dropped Shuuko as he fell to the ground himself.

That of course, woke Shuuko up. Looking ahead, she saw the strange looking man emerge from the trees grinning evilly. Then, he took out a book and pencil and quickly wrote a few lines into it.

"Who the heck is that?" Shuuko looked towards Ritsuki with a questionable look.

Ritsuki had an impassive look on his face.

"Another Jinchuuriki."


	7. The Jinchuuriki From Kumogakure

_Chapter Seven: The Jinchuuriki From the Village Hidden in the Clouds_

Shuuko gave Ritsuki a rather perplexed look."What do you mean _another _Jinchuuriki?"

Ritsuki didn't look at the confused girl.

"So your telling me, that this deranged looking guy that attacks us, er you, out of nowhere... is a Jinchuuriki?! How can you tell?" Shuuko replied a little panicky.

"Look at the mark on his face." Ritsuki pointed at the bull horn looking mark on the man's cheek.

The man ran over to the two prepared to attack once more, just when Shuuko rose her hand.

"Stop!" Surprisingly, the man did. "We're Jinchuuriki just like you. The only reason we're here is to look for others like us!" For a second the whole forest was silent.

Then the man began to move once more and he lifted up his sword and placed it back inside the saya. (Japanese term for a scabbard) He walked over to Ritsuki and pulled the sword from his shoulder, and then picked up the ones that were scattered all over the ground.

As soon as all of the swords were back inside their scabbards that were on his back, he looked up and smiled. "Yo."

Ritsuki continued giving him his permanent glare, as Shuuko smiled at him and returned the greeting.

"My name's Shuuko. And this is Ritsuki! What's your name?" The green-haired girl replied, all smiles.

"Killer Bee." Shuuko and Ritsuki twitched at the strange name. "Killer... Bee...?" Shuuko replied looking a confused as if she hadn't heard the man correctly.

"Yep." The man answered still grinning widely, unfazed by Ritsuki's permanent glare that stayed on the boy.

"I'm the Jinchuuriki of the Hachibi." The man replied rather proudly.

"I'm the Seven-Tailed Jinchuuriki and Ritsuki is the Six-Tailed Jinchuuriki. Um... are there any other Jinchuuriki who live in the Cloud Village?" Shuuko asked the man.

"I think so... But I've never met him." The man answered.

The three er, two (Ritsuki's not really a talkative person) continued talking for quite a while. Killer Bee finally agreed to come along with Ritsuki and Shuuko and he even agreed to help them look for the other Jinchuuriki in the Lighting Country.

* * *

Early the following morning, the three set out to go find the other Jinchuuriki. After quite some time, the three stopped for a break and that was when they found _her_.

She was walking down the street and Killer Bee had said something about his instincts and thought that she was the one.

The strange thing was, he was right. After questioning her (it took a while to get some things out of her) she finally spoke and then finally agreed to come along with them.

She told them her name was Yugito. Then, she said she had heard about a Jinchuuriki from Konoha.

So the group of four set out to go find the Jinchuuriki from the Land of Fire.

* * *

**Author's Note: This chapter is shorter than most chapters. Sorry about that. New characters get introduced at the beginning of the next chapter. And I'd like to take this moment to thank all of the people who have reviewed: AP- Rhapsody, Blackheart Syaoran, Elemental Dragon Swordman, 3karen3, and oxGhostSlayerxo. I also want to thank Blackheart Syaoran for the constructive criticism. I appreciate the reviews and I hope you enjoy and review the chapters that I will be publishing in the future. Much appreciated, Sapphire X Dreams.**


	8. Sin

_Chapter Eight: Sin_

_"We have two matters to discuss." A voice spoke up. "One, is that we have enrolled a new member. His name is Deidara." _

_The room was filled up the rest of the way with silence. _

_"Now for the other matter of business." The same voice replied. _

_"I'm going to say this, and say this only _**once**_." The distant voice spoke up from the darkness. _

_"Deidara... you have the Ichibi." The same voice said. _

_"Ha, ha, ha, giving him the easiest assignment because he's new, as well as the fact that he's the youngest. Very smart, Leader." A different voice spoke up from the darkness. _

_From the darkness, barley noticeable, a glare was formed on one of the people's faces. It was directed at someone on his opposite side. _

_The one glaring was most likely Deidara himself. _

_"Kisame shush." The first voice spoke up again. "The Nibi is given to Hidan." _

_"You're freakin' kidding me!" Most likely, Hidan said. _

_"Hidan, shut up. Even you admit that you're the slowest attacker of us all." A low deep voice replied at Hidan from across the room._

_"Shut up, you__ asshole__." Hidan scoffed at the voice that answered him. _

_"The Sanbi will go to Konan." The man said and the person who was known as Konan looked up and gave a simple nod. _

_"The Yonbi is Kisame's." The person the name 'Kisame' belonged to, looked up and flashed the speaker a toothy grin and a low chuckle. Which was responded by with an eye roll from Deidara. _

_"I will get the Gobi myself; and the Rokubi will go to Sasori." _

_The one known as Sasori stayed unfazed and continued looking forward. _

_"The Shichibi is Kakuzu's Jinchuuriki and- "You've gotta' be kidding me!!" A certain voice that belonged to Hidan called out. _

_"I get the Nibi and he gets the Jinchuuriki that has five more tails that mine does! That's __ bullshit__!" _

_Ignoring that comment, the speaker ignored Hidan's mouth and continued on. _

_"The Hachibi will be given to someone later on and Itachi will be capturing the Kyuubi."_

_"You're kidding me! What makes you think that Itachi can capture the Kyuubi?? He's going to capture him with his stupid genjutsu!" Hidan yelled. _

_No one answered him. The room stayed silent for a while, and then someone finally spoke up and said the words that everyone wanted someone _**else**_ to say. _

_"Hidan... shut the hell up." _

"Thanks!" The long-haired blond woman ran away from the cart with a medium-sized crimson apple.

The woman caught up with three others. "The people in the Water Country are really nice. I wonder if their as nice as the people in the Leaf Village." The woman said smiling as she bit into the apple.

"At the rate we're going and how many stops you're taking, we'll never get to the Leaf Village." Ritsuki mumbled.

"What was that?" Yugito said giving the boy next to her a look.

"Guys, stop fighting, please." Shuuko shook her head all of a sudden she stopped in front of someone.

It was a boy. He was much shorter than the rest of them, and he had blond hair and dark purple eyes. From his right eye, there was a large and long stitched scar coming from it.

"Oh... Hi!" Shuuko smiled at the boy who continued staring right at her. His lavender eyes didn't shift or move from her face. He sat there with an expressionless face just looking at her.

Scooting away a little bit, Shuuko bumped right into Killer Bee. All of a sudden, the strange boy began laughing. Like a real deranged person.

"Oh, hi!" The boy bellowed obviously forcing a smile to form on his lips. "I've never seen you here before." The boy replied his smile dropping from his face in an instant. His face turned back to the same cold look as before.

"Oh... we're just... passing through here... to.. um... get to the... Leaf Village... that's all." Shuuko said practically hiding behind Killer Bee now.

"Are you looking for something?" The boy said coming closer.

"How do you know?" Yugito replied pushing herself in front and giving him an innocent smile.

The boy gave no answer. "All four of you. You're all Jinchuuriki." The boy replied.

"How do you know?" Killer Bee inquired. A cocky smile appeared on the boy's face. "My Bijuu told me."

The three exchanged glances. "So... you're one too!" A smile replaced the scared look on Shuuko's face as she ran over to him.

"I'm Shuuko. This is Killer Bee, this is Yugito, and this is Ritsuki." Shuuko said motioning to each of them in turn.

"How did your Bijuu know we were Jinchuuriki? Can it sense our chakra?" Yugito asked.

"He tells me things that are going to happen in the future. There's absolutely no doubt that they wouldn't happen. The thing is, I just need to get him to shut up. One day, I'm going to make sure he never talks again." The boy grinned evilly.

"How are you going to do that?" Yugito asked. "By sealing his mouth shut." The boy said. "By the way, my name is Rikuto. I'll come with you to find the other Jinchuuriki if you want."

"Sure!" Shuuko smiled brightly and then the five began moving again.

As they walked, Yugito leaned down next to Shuuko and whispered to her.

"Are you sure we should be taking this kid with us? He seems a little.... out there."

Shuuko paid no mind to the comment and continued walking.

_"Are you ready to go out to get the Nibi?" A masked man walking into the room where a silver headed man lay in the middle of the floor inside a bloody circle._

_"Shut up my ritual is not over yet!" The man yelled. "Damn this ritual of yours. Can't you just skip it?" The masked man replied. _

_"If I don't do it then, I sin against Jashin! Besides, we still have this Jinchuuriki tracked. She won't go far." _


	9. Iwa

_Chapter Nine: Iwa_

_(Note: Incase you don't know, Iwa means Rock/stone) _

"We're in the Earth country." Yugito announced. "Although we really should be in Konoha."

"It was better to stop at Iwgakure before going to Konoha, it was closer to the Water Country anyway." Shuuko answered.

"So, you are positive that there are _two _Jinchuuriki here?" Shuuko asked turning towards Rikuto who stood next to her.

"Yes. Their names are Roushi and Gouta. The Jinchuuriki for the five and four tailed beasts."

"Well, I guess we should hurry up and go get them." Shuuko said turning to the others and smiling.

The five headed off down the cliff towards Iwagakure which was below.

Elsewhere, Kisame and Itachi walked through the village. "So this is the village we're dealing with." A blue shark-looking man said looking over the peaceful village of Iwagakure.

"We're not going after the Jinchuuriki just yet. First we'll survey the area to see how well we can get around." A man who most likely is Itachi speaks up. He has red eyes with strange pupils and long black hair tied into a pony-tail.

"Too bad Deidara couldn't have come with us, he would probably know this village better than us." Kisame replied staring at Itachi.

Itachi didn't reply. He just stood up and then began proceeding into the village.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

An incredibly tall person walked down the street all covered by red and heavy clothing, he even had a mask on and all that was seen were his brown eyes. He tensed and stopped abruptly.

_"That chakra in the air.... it's very powerful. But it belongs to many different sources." _Then, the boy's eyes widened even more. _"Jinchuuriki?! You're kidding me!" _He ran down the street searching all areas in between buildings and down dark alleys, but he didn't find what he was looking for.

Another man walked down the street. He had dark maroon hair and mustache. He had on rather insane outfit and he had a strange long black mark over his nose and cheeks. He continued walking and then felt a shadow fall on him. Turning around he saw nothing and continued walking.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

"There." Rikuto spoke up and pointed at the masked boy in the red cloth. "He's one of the Jinchuuriki we're looking for."

"This is easier than I expected!" Shuuko smiled and Killer Bee nodded in agreement. The green haired girl ran feverishly over to the boy.

"Hi!" She smiled brightly to get a blank stare back at her. Then, all of a sudden, the strange but strong urge of chakra kicked in his body once more.

The boy turned straight to her, a surprised look on his face. "A Jinchuuriki!" The boy accidentally blurted out and stared at the girl.

"Really? How'd you know?" Shuuko answered giving him a confused look. Without letting him answer, she spoke again. "You're a Jinchuuriki as well!! At least... that's what Rikuto says. Is that true?"

The boy nodded. "Cool! Um... why are you dressed like that?" The boy ignored the question, and then looked behind Shuuko to see the other four Jinchuuriki behind her.

After introducing all of they're names, Shuuko began talking about how they were looking for another Jinchuuriki there.

"I've seen him before." Gouta (the masked boy) said to her. "But only once. He was taking a break from his training once. I didn't get to speak to him because I had my own training to do. He looked really strange though. He had a strange black mark over his nose and on his cheeks."

Yugito placed a hand on her chin and tried to think of the person Gouta was describing. All of a sudden, Ritsuki finally spoke up. "I think that's him." He pointed down the street so they could see a man with exactly the same description Gouta had described.

He was running down the village at lighting speed. He seemed to be running from someone or something. "Hey! Over here!" Shuuko began waving her arms for the man to come over, and sure enough he did.

Finally, the six got to see a look at whom was chasing the man.

Two men dressed in long black coats, with red clouds.


	10. The Pursuers

_Chapter Ten: The Pursuers_

The two pursers ran after the group of Jinchuuriki. Kisame's face turned astonished. _"All of them... are Jinchuuriki!"_

Before the group of seven could run away from the two, the man who was being chased caught sight of the Sharingan in one of the pursuer's eyes.

Ignoring that fact, the seven ran from the scene only to be chased by the two mysterious men.

"Itachi-san. You said that we weren't capturing the Jinchuuriki yet." Kisame stated as the two ran at top speed. "With all of those Jinchuuriki, it would the perfect chance to catch them." Itachi replied solemnly.

"Who one earth are those two?!" Shuuko asked as she ran with the rest of her friends.

"I'm not exactly sure." Yugito answered looking behind her to get a better look at the two. "That shark thing scares me though." She answered sarcastically.

"How do we lose them?" Shuuko asked facing forward once more. The man with the strange mark over his nose and cheeks (known as Roushi) stopped and formed a few hand seals. Then, lava spilled up from the ground and created something that resembled a barrier made of hardened lava.

The two Akatsuki members skidded to a stop. "That should hold them for a while." Roushi replied and continued running with the other six.

Using the strange eye technique he wields, Itachi used Amaterasu to burn down the lava wall. But after it was completely burned down, he didn't proceed to chase the group.

"Something wrong, Itachi?" Kisame asked turning towards his team member. "We're not going after them?" "We should tell Leader first." Itachi replied.

Kisame stared blankly at his partner for a second then finally agreed. The two disappeared quickly in puffs of smoke.

"You really think that would hold them for a while?" Shuuko asked abruptly stopping on a tree and looked up to stare at Roushi.

"I don't feel their chakra anymore, so they must not be coming." Gouta said answering for the other Rock nin.

"Who are you guys anyway?" Roushi asked looking up at the group again. After a quick explanation of identity, Roushi nodded a bit.

"Who were those guys?" Shuuko asked turning to Roushi who stayed silent.

There was silence throughout the entire group. "Are we going to keep moving or not?" Rikuto turned to the others who nodded in agreement, then went off to get to Konoha.

* * *

Elsewhere, a certain knuckle-headed ninja was busy slurping down a bowl of boiling ramen. A huge grin spread across the ninja's face. "This is obviously the best ramen around! I'll have seconds on that ramen, old man!" "Coming right up." The 'old man' said and filled the customer's bowl once more.

Too bad the ninja was completely unaware of the people who were coming after him.

At least, for the time being.

* * *

_**Author's Note: I've been getting some questions for this story and I kept forgetting to answer. (stupid me...) So now I'm going to answer them.**_

_**Ellisama's Question: How old is Naruto, or during which arc in the canon they will meet him?**_

_**Answer: In this story, Naruto is going to be 15-16 in this story. Almost all of the Jinchuuriki are this age. At least, Rikuto, Gaara, Shuuko, and Ritsuki are. Yugito is 20, Gouta is 19, Killer Bee (that's unknown...) And Roushi well, let's just say he's old.... X D**_

_**Yuuri Yotsuki's Question: How long is this story going to be?**_

_**Answer: Truthfully, this fanfic is supposed to be more than twenty chapters. I think that this story may end in the triple digits but I'm not sure yet. The weird thing is that, I have no clue how it will end....**_

_**3karen3's Question: Are ther going to be any pairings in this story?**_

_**Answer: This story was not exactly supposed to be a romance story, but I do plan on putting in a few love scenes here and there. Just don't expect any kisses or anything. (don't know how I could fit that into a fanfic like this) **_

_**Random Question Some People Are Wondering: Are they ever going to meet Naruto and Gaara?**_

_**Answer: Yes. They're going to meet Naruto, Gaara, Hinata and a few other people....**_

Thank you everyone for reviewing!!! I really appreciate it.


	11. The Nine Tailed Jinchuuriki

_Chapter Eleven: The Nine-Tailed Jinchuuriki _

The blond-haired boy continued slurping down bowl after bowl of ramen at lighting speed. "Another bowl old man! This time with extra miso pork!" The blond exclaimed brightly. "Coming right up, Naruto."

"Look at that guy!" Yugito said in total awe. "It's disgusting," Rikuto replied giving the blond-haired boy a look. (although the blond couldn't even see his face). "It reminds me of a human vacuum." Shuuko replied. "Or even a humming bird." Killer Bee let out a chuckle and wrote the line down in his book.

Ritsuki got up from behind the building they had been hiding behind. They had arrived in Konoha that morning at three. Then, it had taken them three more hours to find the Jinchuuriki, using the words from Rikuto's bijuu and Gouta sensing his chakra.

So there, right in front of them, was the blond Nine-Tailed Jinchuuriki himself. The black-haired Jinchuuriki walked over to the ramen stand and came behind the boy and put his hand on the boy's shoulder.

Practically jumping out of his skin, the boy spit out his ramen and practically choked. Grabbing for his glass of water, the blond slurped down the water, cutting off more and more of Ritsuki's patience, which by the way he didn't have much of. Giving him an annoyed glare, the boy finally slammed his glass back down on the counter and jerked his head to the stranger.

"What the heck was that for?! You practically gave me a heart attack!" The blond's half angered face disappeared and changed to confusion. "Who are you?" He blinked waiting for the mysterious boy's answer.

Before he could answer, the man who was making the ramen (also know as Teuchi Ichiraku) asked him if he would like some ramen as well.

"I don't think I'd ever eat that stuff and after _his_ (Naruto's) display of how_ he_ eats ramen." Ritsuki answered.

"Who the hell are you anyway?!" Naruto repeated the question as he got up from his chair and glared at the boy across from him. "Don't worry, that's just Ritsuki." A voice said from behind Naruto.

Behind him, Shuuko and the others stood there, Shuuko smiling at him. Naruto's mouth dropped open. "Who are you guys?"

Again, much explaining was done and finally, the boy also introduced himself. "I'm Naruto Uzumaki! I'm gonna' be Hokage one day." "We're looking for one last Jinchuuriki, do you know where he is?" Gouta asked Naruto.

"I don't really know. I have no information about him." Naruto replied.

"He's either the Shukaku or the Kyuubi." Roushi replied.

Naruto's eyes widened knowing that he knew who both the Kyuubi and Shukaku's Jinchuurikis' were.

"That means you're looking for Gaara." Naruto said turning towards them. The happiness seemed to have been drowned from his voice. "Gaara?" Killer Bee asked. "Where does he live?" "In the Sand Village." Naruto told them. "Is he a friend of your or something?" Yugito inquired.

"Yeah!" A smile broke out on Naruto's face.

Just then, someone called out, "Naruto!! Who are you talking to?!" It was a familiar voice. The rest of them turned around to see a certain pink-haired girl standing a

while away from her friend.

"Who's that?" Rikuto asked pointing at the girl. "Oh, that's just Sakura." Naruto waved at the girl and she hurried over.

The place became an ocean of conversation (mostly from Shuuko and Naruto's side). Shuuko began going on and on about how she had met all of the other Jinchuuriki and finally, she got to the part with the men who were chasing them.

"I'm sorry, tell me again what they were wearing?" Sakura asked the green-haired girl once more. "They were wearing black coats with red clouds." Shuuko answered.

Sakura's eyes widened and her mouth opened, but she only spoke in a whisper. "The... Akatsuki..."


	12. The Akatsuki

_Chapter Twelve: The Akatsuki _

_Itachi and Kisame entered the darkened hideout. "What did you find out?" The leader flashed his grayish-white eyes at the two. _

_"We found the Yonbi, but we didn't capture him." Kisame replied to the question. _

_"And why not?" The silver headed man with a bad tongue snapped at the two. _

_"We found _**six **_other Jinchuuriki with him." Itachi replied._

_The rest of the members remained speechless, until finally one spoke._

_"__**Six**__." A blue-haired woman replied masking her surprise._

_Kisame nodded. _

_"Are they planning something?" A red-headed person looked up, arms-crossed. _

_A wide evil smile spread across Kisame's blue face. _

_"Most likely." He then let out a chuckle and the Leader left the room to think it over. _

"An organization of S-ranked missing nins?!" Shuuko replied looking surprised.

It was nearing nighttime and the other Jinchuuriki had settled inside the ramen shop and were eating ramen. All except for Ritsuki who was standing with his back against the wall.

Sakura nodded. "Most of the info about the organization is still left in the dark. Not even Lady Tsunade knows that much about them. But one of the things we know is that, they're after Jinchuuriki."

"Do you know about any of the members?" Gouta asked. (he also wasn't eating) "We only know about a shark-like man and Sasuke's brother, Itachi."

Shuuko practically choked on her ramen. "We've seen them! They were after Roushi." She indicated the Yonbi's Jinchuuriki with a chopstick.

"What?! Really?!" Sakura stood up gaping at the crimson-eyed girl. "We've got to tell Lady Tsunade right away!" The pink-haired girl turned to leave but someone grabbed her wrist.

"No." Roushi shook his head. "Not yet."

"What do you mean not yet?!" Sakura gasped glaring at the man. "Don't tell her just yet." It took a while for the emerald-eyed girl to take it all in, but finally she relaxed and sat back down in her chair.

"Anyway, Itachi and his partner, were after Naruto one time. They tried to capture him but the Legendary Sannin Jiraiya saved him. I heard from Naruto that they were strong, and that Sasuke was beaten terribly when he came in and tried to take revenge on his brother." Sakura continued.

"Who's Sasuke?" Rikuto turned looking up from his bowl that was still half-filled with maroon broth.

Sakura and Naruto stayed silent for a while, forlorn looks on each of their faces.

"He was my best friend. But he went to Orochimaru for power." Naruto replied dryly not even making an effort to look at the other Jinchuuriki as well as Sakura. They all had their eyes on him.

"But I swear," Naruto slammed his hand on the table making it shake and making the glasses clang slightly. "I'll bring him back no matter what."

The others stared at him in utter silence. And it took quite a while until someone else spoke. "Don't worry, Naruto. I have complete faith in you." Shuuko flashed the blond boy a smile. Naruto flashed her a big goofy one in return.

Naruto sat back down and slurped down the broth in his last bowl. The groups left the ramen shop, and just as Sakura was about to leave, her shoulder was grabbed by Roushi.

"Remember, don't tell the Hokage _anything_." He said to the girl, his eye's expressionless and the look on his face serious. Sakura nodded and then went home hoping that should could do just that.

**Okay so here are the questions I've gotten for this story. **

**Elemental Dragon Swordman: Question: Is the next chapter about Gaara being kidnapped or about something else?**

**Answer: Yes the next chapter is about something else. But the chapters revolving around Gaara being kidnapped is not that far from now. In fact, I'm working on that part in the story right now. **

**Yuuri Yotsuki: You didn't exactly have a question, but I like your idea. I will be using it. I hope that's alright with for the idea!!!!**

**Author's Note: Yuuri Yotsuki gave said that I should create a Jinchuuriki guide for their biographies. I'm going to create that and it will be up VERY soon. It will include info about all of the Jinchuuriki (including Gaara and Naruto although it's not really needed). So if you want to know something about the Jinchuuriki, please review that story. It will be called 'Jinchuuriki Biographies' (just to make it clear, I wouldn't be adding the entire life story of Naruto and Gaara, it will be WAY too long and most people already know it anyway) **

**Thanks for reviewing!!! **


	13. An Ill Omen

_ Chapter Thirteen: An Ill Omen_

**Author's Note: If you have seen the latest Shippuuden episode or have heard, then you know that the Three Tailed Jinchuuriki Arc is coming up. Since you are reading my fanfic Jinchuuriki, you already know I have created my own Three Tailed Jinchuuriki named Rikuto. I'm just hoping that no one gets the two mixed up (that most likely won't happen but just in case). Thank you SO much for reading Jinchuuriki. And don't ever hesitate to review, I feed off of them. :D Thanks! **

Off in Sunagakure, the giant sand building for the Kazekage was standing tall as the breeze blew small grains of sand off of the building.

On the inside, a red-head and green-eyed boy stared down at the Kazekage hat that lay upon his desk.

He stared blankly at the hat showing no expression whatsoever. The boy was wearing a long blue and white outfit that was made for the Kazekage.

He stood in silence in his office, and then walked over to the window were the wind was blowing the grain straight through the air without ceasing for a second.

In another room still located in the same building, a young man dressed all in black with strange purple face makeup was messing with puppets on a bed.

The young man was known as Sabaku no Kankurou. He held up a creepy looking puppet and played around with its mouth for a while opening and closing it slowly as the puppet made a soft chattering noise.

Around Kankurou's feet there were the inside parts that belonged to the puppet known as Karasu.

"I've 'gotta stop being so rough with, Karasu." Kankurou replied to himself picking up one of the fingers and attaching it to the hand.

Lifting the puppet up, Kankurou notices a stamp on the puppet that had a red scorpion on it.

"I've seen this stamp on all of my puppets but, I have no clue who made them." Kankurou inspected the stamp carefully and then remembered a name he had heard before.

"Akasuna no Sasori," The name rolled off Kankurou's tongue. "He left the village about twenty years ago so I guess he would have been born by then." Kankurou replied still staring questionably at the stamp.

Kankurou quickly shook the thought off and picked up Karasu's head from the floor and began making sure everything worked fine there.

The head slipped out of his fingers and fell to the ground. It seemed as if it were falling in slow motion.

But as soon as it hit the floor, a long jagged crack ran through the side of it.

A sour look crossed Kankurou's face. Small grains of wood ran from the inside of the head. It looked much like the sand outside.

Kankurou stared at the crack on his puppet's head, and then, something in his _own_ head told him that something was coming, and it was dangerous and coming soon.

He tried shaking this idea off as well as he could. Then, reached down and picked up the head, but the idea wouldn't disappear.

He put the head on his bed and left the room. Once he reached his destination, he opened the door to the Kazekage's office.

"Hey, Gaara?" Kankurou called. The red-headed boy known as Gaara turned around to stare at Kankurou. He had been focused on what was going on outside the window.

"Watch your back okay?" Kankurou replied to which Gaara nodded his head. After a while longer of staring, Kankurou took his leave.


	14. Gaara

_Chapter Fourteen: Gaara_

"Naruto, tell us more about the Jinchuuriki for the Shukaku." Gouta asked looking up from the ground.

All of the Jincuuriki were in Naruto's apartment sprawled in places on the floor. Naruto had agreed to let them stay with him for one night.

"You mean Gaara?" Naruto asked as he put his headband on a nightstand.

"Whatever his name is." Rikuto said looking at Naruto, whose expression turned from confused to irritated.

"Sakura told me that Gaara was the son of the Fourth Kazekage. He had an uncle named Yashamaru." Naruto replied dryly.

"Like all Jinchuuriki, Gaara was hated by every person in his village! Even his own father! And the only person who really loved him was his uncle Yashamaru. Or so he thought."

"Finally, Gaara's asshole of a father began sending a bunch of people to assassinate Gaara. But he was protected by his sand. Then, Gaara's dad sent Yashamaru to kill Gaara. But it was the opposite and Gaara killed Yashamaru instead. The terrible thing was...." Naruto's voice trailed off and he left his sentence up in the air.

"Yashamaru took the mission to assassinate Gaara willingly."

"What a slug." Yugito sneered glaring. "I feel like just punching that bastard right now! I can't believe how he played with Gaara's emotions like that!"

Naruto stared at the crazy woman who looked rather scary when she was enraged. Calming herself down (to Naruto's relief), she prepared to listen to the rest of the story.

"And then, one time after the Chunin Exams, I fought Gaara. He was really strong, but his Shukaku was really scary. It was loud and really... unlike him." Naruto replied processing the memory again.

"I finally beat him after summoning a toad that got Gaara out of his Shukaku form. It seems like Gaara's changed a lot since then."

"It seems like you can really change people, Naruto." Gouta spoke up, calmly as always.

A grin spread across the crazy ninja's face. "You really think so?"

"I want to meet this Gaara person!" Shuuko replied standing up. "I bet he's really cool and awesome and fun and-" "Probably weak."

Shuuko looked over to see Ritsuki who had interrupted her. "What do you mean weak?!" Both Naruto and Shuuko exclaimed in unison.

"He's the container for the Ichibi. How strong can a one-tailed bijuu be?" Ritsuki answered, turning away from the two.

"You have too much faith in your bijuu, Ritsuki." Rikuto responded looking up at Ritsuki. "One day your bijuu just might let you down and you end up killing yourself on _your own account_."

Ritsuki shot the shorter boy a glare. "Stop fighting you two." Roushi spoke up preventing Ritsuki from responding.

Killer Bee let out a chuckle as he put his little book of rhymes away. Naruto shook his head at the two. "Alright everyone, I'm tired!" Naruto yawned and then fell face-first into his pillow.

Across the room, Gouta turned off the light and everyone was soon a slave to their dreams.


	15. Entries of Ten

_Chapter Fifteen: Entries of Ten _

It was sunny the next day. All of the Jinchuuriki excluding Naruto were sitting on the grass in a park-like place, waiting for something.

Elsewhere, Naruto peeked behind a building at a masked silver-haired man holding an orange book that read 'Make Out Tactics' on the front in red.

Naruto tip-toed over to the man who was sitting at Konoha's dango shop in a chair, his back facing the entrance of the restaurant.

Slowly coming behind him, Naruto grabbed for a book in the Jonin's back pouch. After snagging it, he flinched and then scampered from the shop just as his sensei turned around.

"Naruto and his antics," the silver-haired jonin replied rolling his eyes.

The blonde-haired genin ran off as fast as he could with the book in hand. He arrived at the park where the other Jinchuuriki were waiting.

Naruto dropped the stolen object from his hand onto the ground and everyone huddled around it.

"There it is; stolen straight from Kakashi-sensei's pocket." Naruto reported proudly. Yugito grabbed at the book and fanned through the pages quickly.

"There are a lot of entries," she reported after scanning the pages herself. Roushi took the book and looked through it. "Hmm..." the older man rubbed his chin gazing at the pages.

"Look," Killer Bee exclaimed looking at the book from over Roushi's shoulder. Everyone huddled around to see an entry in the book stating someone from the Akatsuki.

"_Itachi Uchiha..._" Rikuto read off the page. "Uchiha?" Gouta replied. "Doesn't the Kekkei Genkai of the Sharingan run in the Uchiha clan?" Naruto nodded in response.

"Then one of the people who were pursuing us before is most likely Itachi." Roushi responded.

"What do you mean _most likely_?! It_ is_ him! It has to be him." Shuuko snapped. "There's no other Uchiha in the Akatsuki."

"We don't know for sure." Gouta replied. "But it says here that this Itachi Uchiha guy killed the entire clan except for his younger brother. So they're all dead!" Shuuko replied shaking her head.

"Whatever you say, Shuuko." Gouta replied rolling his eyes in return. "I've seen Sasuke's brother before. He was with some creepy shark guy that wanted to cut my limbs off." Naruto shuddered as he remembered the thought.

"Oh yeah! We saw him too!" Shuuko replied turning the page over to the spot where the shark man's picture was plastered in full-size.

Naruto again shuddered at the picture. "Yep. That's him." Rikuto nodded in response.

"_Kisame Hoshigaki..._" Rikuto read the name aloud off the page once more. "From the Hidden Mist Village. He began assassinating the local Mist feudal lords. Then, he fled the village and joined the Akatsuki Organization."

"I wonder who his Jinchuuriki is." Naruto replied staring at the page. "Who was Itachi's Jinchuuriki?" Shuuko asked looking up at Naruto.

The blonde pointed at himself and then his head drooped.

"You?"

The blonde nodded sadly. Then Shuuko turned back to the book. "I hope I don't have that Kisame guy. He's freaky."

"Actually, that's Roushi's captor." Rikuto replied looking up. "How does he know?" Naruto replied giving Rikuto a 'look.'

"His bijuu can sense powerful chakra and he can predict the future or something retarded like that." Yugito responded which was answered by a glare from Rikuto.

Naruto stared at Rikuto for a while long before turning back to the page which was already being flipped.

It landed on a page with a red-headed man's picture. "_Akasuna no Sasori._" Yugito read the page. "No doubt. He's from Sunagakure."

"He's probably after Gaara!" Shuuko exclaimed until Ritsuki hit her in the back of the head with his fist.

"It says he _left_ the village twenty years ago," the black-haired boy responded glaring at the girl who was now laughing nervously.

"It says he's a highly skilled puppet-maker." Gouta read off the page. "I wonder if Gaara's brother knows him." Naruto responded blinking and looking back at the book.

Roushi flipped the page to a half-white half-black faced person. "_Zetsu..._" Naruto read aloud. "There's not much information about him." Roushi said turning the page. "There's no more entries." Naruto reported.

"Look at the most recent." Shuuko replied. Roushi obeyed and began turning the pages to the front. "The latest entry is Sasuke." Gouta replied. Ritsuki grabbed the book and flipped through its pages quickly.

He stopped flipping when he came to a page with a blond-haired young man on the page. "_Deidara..._" Ritsuki read aloud. "He's one of the latest entries. He's a prodigy from the Hidden Rock Village. It only says that he was an assassin bomber for higher." Ritsuki closed the book and handed it back to Naruto.

Yugito rolled her eyes. "What alternate universe do they get these freaks?" She sighed shaking her head. "This afternoon we'll be heading out." Gouta replied as Naruto turned to return the book.

"Okay! Don't worry, I'll be there!" Naruto replied running off.

* * *

Elsewhere, Sakura walked over to Tsunade. "Are you ready to begin your training?" Tsunade asked Sakura. Sakura nodded, but the warning that Roushi had given her the day before still weighed heavily on her mind.

* * *

**Author's Note: Elemental Dragon Swordman asked that Akasuna no Sasori was Sasori's full name. No. I do not know Sasori's full name or if he even has one. Akasuna means 'red sands'. It's sort of like Sasori's title so to speak. **


	16. The Kazekage

_Chapter Sixteen: The Kazekage_

All eight Jinchuuriki trooped through the sandy deserts of Sunagakure. Most of them were silent but others were not so quiet.

"We've been walking for hours!!" Shuuko whined to the others. "Can we please stop now?!" The others except for Naruto of course ignored her. Naruto flat out agreed.

"My feet are killing me!!" Naruto complained stopping. His feet slowly began seeping into the hot sand beneath him.

"We're almost there." Yugito called looking behind her. "Hurry up." Killer Bee called out.

Cursing the entire way, Shuuko and Naruto both caught up to the group.

The hot sand whisked through the air. "Why does the Kazekage's office have to be located so far?!" Naruto exclaimed looking at the sky which was now turning dark.

"You did say that Gaara was the Kazekage, right?" Shuuko replied looking at Naruto who nodded in response. "Why does it have to be the _Kaze_kage? Why not the _Mizu_kage?!" Shuuko complained.

When the group finally reached the Kazekage's office, they were stopped by guards. After much explanation from Naruto, they were allowed to walk into a room where a meeting was in full swing.

"Hey, Gaara!" Naruto busted in through the doors. Gaara turned towards Naruto. All of the other Sand Ninja officials looked up and stared at Naruto with annoyed expressions.

"Can't you see we're having a meeting?!" One of the ninja got up and glared at the eight intruders.

"They're going to be staying," the red-haired Kazekage replied after working out some details with Naruto.

"Uh... okay," the man who had made the outburst sat down and waiting for one of the others to speak.

"The subject at large is the Akatsuki. There is almost absolutely nothing known about them." A man who went by the name Yawara spoke to the others. "But we do know they that wear black coats that bear strange red clouds."

"They also wear multicolored rings. From what we all know, they are all S-class criminals. And one of them is Itachi, Sasuke Uchiha's brother," another man told the others.

"Uchiha Sasuke is also an S-class criminal, right?" Gaara replied in his low and barley audible voice.

Naruto nodded.

"They have some real _freaks _in the Akatsuki!" Shuuko exclaimed. "They have this plant thing and this weird shark guy thing!" Rikuto rolled his eyes and Yugito pulled Shuuko back into her seat with an irritated look on her face.

"We are currently unaware of what the Akatsuki's plans are, but from what Kazekage-sama heard from his friend (Naruto), he thinks that they are after Jinchuuriki." Yawara replied eyeing all of the Jinchuuriki, including Naruto. "You need to be careful."

"What are you going to do now?" Gaara asked looking at the others. No one had a chance to answer, because Shuuko did that for them. "Train."

Everyone directed their gaze at her.

"There's no way that we'll know when the Akatsuki will strike. And we can't be sure they are after Jinchuuriki. Besides, we need to be strong so when they come into the picture, we'll be ready." Shuuko smiled at the others and Naruto nodded in agreement.

"I'm going to train harder than ever!" Naruto exclaimed, his goofy grin brightening his face. "We'll return to our villages and train as hard as we can until the Akatsuki comes back!"

After a while of silence, the Sand officials finally nodded in agreement and then waiting for the Kazekage's answer. Finally, Gaara nodded. "Be careful," he warned and all of the shinobi nodded.

* * *

"Later, Gaara!" Naruto yelled at the top of his lungs. That was followed by Gaara giving him a low wave back.

* * *

"I guess this is it for now." Yugito replied looking at all of the others.

"Hopefully we'll see each other soon." Roushi said nodding.

All nine of the Jinchuuriki turned away to walk their separate paths back to their villages.

What they didn't know, was how much trouble there would be in the future.

Once they met again.


	17. An Empty Picture

_Chapter Seventeen: The Empty Picture_

**Author's Note: This chapter may seem pretty useless, but most of the stuff is going to be used later on. **

Shuuko sighed heavily as she slammed the door of her house shut and leaned against it. "It was harder sneaking back into the village then sneaking out," the green-haired girl sighed exasperated. She took off the large red pack from her back and flung it on her bed. Then she flopped down next to it and stared at the ceiling.

It had taken her two straight days to get back to the Waterfall village. She hadn't gotten sleep at all.

Suddenly, something on her nightstand caught her eye. It had taken four months to track down all of the jinchuuriki and she hadn't been in her house since. She was actually surprised her house hadn't been burned down yet.

She grabbed at the object and discovered that it was a photo. The picture was of a red-haired woman with two green streaks in her hair. She had a cocky look on her face and by her attire, it was obvious she was a shinobi.

The woman in the picture had on a short, khaki-colored and sleeveless shirt with a fishnet shirt underneath. She had on a matching skirt with fishnets underneath that as well. In her hand she had a kunai.

After studying this picture, Shuuko realized this must have been her mother. She saw a resemblance in both of their faces. She had never seen this picture EVER in her room before. Morashita-sensei must have put it in her house. He had probably thought that she had left to get fresh air or something.

Then Shuuko remembered Morashita sensei. A bitter and heavy feeling entered her stomach. He was going to be furious if he found out she was gone. She was _way _behind in her studies. Only a Genin and still in the academy trying to become Chunin. (The Waterfall village has a different school system than the Leaf). She had returned repeatedly to the academy five times already. Now it was her goal to finally become a Chunin.

Shuuko was worried about how angry Morashita-sensei might be, but she wasn't worried about everyone hating her for leaving. For coming back to the village was what people were going to pissed out about.

Shuuko studied the picture a while longer, giving it a suspicious look. Morashita-sensei had obviously put it there. She shrugged it off and put the picture onto the nightstand. Then she climbed into her bed and dozed off.

* * *

In Konoha, Naruto returned in a rush. He zoomed through the village and got to the ramen shop as soon as possible. To his surprise, Sakura was there. "So the others are gone now?" The pink-haired girl asked watching her friend a while later slurp down the soup.

"Mh hmm...." was his reply.

Naruto had made Sakura swear not to tell Tsunade or anyone else about the other jinchuuriki. Actually, he pretty much blackmailed her.

Again the promise that she had made to Roushi poked at her brain and she turned away and prepared herself to leave.

* * *

In the Hot Spring Village, Ritsuki returned. He saw the village looked no different than it had when he had left three months ago.

He walked down the normal streets of Yugakure (Hot Spring village) over to his bloody and now run down rubble that used to be his house. Then a thought hit him.

Now that the other Jinchuuriki were no longer with him, he knew that the terrible nightmares would return every night.

* * *

**Questions: **

**Elemental Dragon Swordman: **Aren't they gonna be in trouble for leaving their villages?

Answer: Yes, that is why they snuck back into their villages. This question popped up in my head when I was writing these chapters awhile ago, they snuck back into their villages. Most of the village people were happy they were gone so they didn't protest. They _are _jinchuuriki, right?


	18. As Long As The Sands Flow

_Chapter Eighteen: As Long As the Sands Flow_

**It had been an entire year since all of the jinchuuriki have seen each other.**

Two figures walked out of a large cave-like building. One of was taller than the other. They both had kasa (bamboo hat) hats on their heads. The low tinkling of a bell rung off of the hat as the two began leaving the cave behind.

"We're heading to Sungakure right, Master Sasori?" The low voice from the taller of the two was the only thing heard after the barley audible footsteps in the rippling water beneath the two. "Hmm.." The shorter one known as Sasori responded. His partner knew this meant 'yes'.

"Do you have any idea where your jinchuuriki is? Hm." The unnamed figure replied. "It's the Rokubi right? Hm."

"I'm actually surprised you remembered, Deidara." Sasori's gruff voice responded.

The one known as Deidara let out a low and short laugh but otherwise didn't respond. The two continued walking in almost complete silence.

In Sunagakure, the Kazekage, Gaara, looked out his window.

"The Akatsuki..." he replied staring out the window.

It was obvious he had a bad feeling in his stomach. Then, he remembered Kankuro's warning.

It was a year ago. He had told him to watch himself. Gaara turned around and walked out from the room.

"Send more security on the lookout," he ordered to the guards standing in the hallway. They nodded and then set off to do just as the Kazekage had ordered.

The terrible feeling in the pit of his stomach still hadn't receded. Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do about it. The young man turned around and went back into his office. He sat down behind his desk, waiting for the terrible feeling to go away.

* * *

After a long while, the members known as Deidara and Sasori finally entered Sunagakure.

"So this is Sunagakure, hm." Deidara replied looking around.

"This is only the border of the village," Sasoris's gruff voice responded.

"Yeah, you should know. You were born here, hm."

"This place means nothing to me anymore."

Deidara turned to his partner and let out a small snort.

"I guess it's a lot more peaceful without you here, hm," Deidara smirked.

"As long as the sands flow, this village will always be peaceful," Sasori replied without looking at Deidara.

The blonde began wondering if this was a lie or the truth.

The two intruders continued walking as their Akatsuki coats blew in the whirlwind of sand.


	19. Distress Call

_Chapter Nineteen: Distress Call _

**Questions: **

**Elemental Dragon Swordman: Will there be something different when Gaara faces Deidara?**

**Answer: No. I won't include the fight because it would be writing things Naruto fans already know about. **

* * *

At first it came as a shock to Sunagakure that they were getting attacked. And by the Akatsuki of all people. By the time that all found out, an explosion or two had already occurred.

With beating hearts and fast hands, a Sand village official was already sending a messenger bird out to Konoha; but there was someone else's hands who it hit first.

* * *

The messenger bird from Sunagakure flew threw the blue skies and over the lush forests of the Waterfall Village to get to Konoha.

Shuuko looked up from the large circle she made around her in her training. "A messenger bird?" the green-haired girl murmured as she eyed the note tied to the bird's thick leg.

Grabbing the bird herself, Shuuko unraveled the note from the bird's leg. She immediately saw that it was blank. She sighed softly and then performed a few hand signs and decoded the message.

She held it up and read it silently, her crimson eyes growing bigger after every sentence.

"The Akatsuki... is fighting Gaara?!" Shuuko gasped. She tied the message back to the bird and then proceeded to writing her own messages to the other jinchuuriki.

It was not until later when most of the Jinchuuriki received Shuuko's messages. The only person who didn't receive the message however, was Naruto.

Naruto was already heading off to Sunagakure to bring back his friend. The thing was, he wasn't the only one sent off.

The seven (not including Naruto and Gaara) jinchuuriki were also on their way to Sunagakure.

* * *

"Mission accomplished, hm," Deidara nodded towards the village that had just been plunged into total turmoil. The blonde was riding on the back of a large white bird. Sand spilled from the bird as it soared off carrying the Ichibi's jinchuuriki on its back.

* * *

**Author's Note: I've noticed the chapters are really short. On my writing program, it looks as if the chapters could be at least two pages long. I am currently working on the chapters in the twenties. I am trying to extend the chapter lengths. Sorry about that. **


	20. The Akatsuki Move

_Chapter Twenty: The Akatsuki Move _

Shuuko dashed through the golden sands of Sunagakure. Her feet kicked the yellow substance into the air and the wind carried it off. From the outside, the village looked completely fine. Did a member of the Akatsuki really invade here?

When Shuuko actually reached the part of the village where everyone was located, she began asking around to get informed about the situation at hand.

"There was one of them that attacked the village." A Sunagakure official replied to the curious girl. "He was blond and he attacked with strange animal-shaped bombs."

Shuuko nodded and then thought back to the Bingo Book that she had looked at a year before.

The latest entry. A bomber for higher. Blonde. Rock Village. Terrorist.

It had to be him! But what was his name again?

Shuuko placed her hand under her chin. She tried to remember the blonde man's name. Something that started with a 'D'.

Shuuko continued thinking about the name when she heard the man talk once again.

"I've never seen you around here before? Are you even from this village?" The man gave Shuuko a suspicious look. A nervous smile appeared on Shuuko's face and her hand immediately covered the Waterfall Village headband on her arm.

"Sure, sure." Shuuko lied and ran off. "Thanks!"

_The Akatsuki have finally started making their move._ Shuuko thought to herself. _They must be capturing Jinchuuriki in order. If so that means that Yugito's next._

Shuuko skidded to a stop when she heard her name echo above her. After turning around, she saw Roushi jump down from a low cliff.

"Are the captor's already gone?" the maroon-haired man turned to Shuuko. He got a nod in response.

"The person who captured Gaara was the man from the Earth country. Your country."

Roushi turned to Shuuko to stare. "I can't remember his name." the green-haired girl responded sheepishly.

"Deidara." The two turned to see Rikuto behind them. "His name was Deidara. The one from the Earth country. The bomber." Next to him was Yugito.

The others didn't reply. "Where's Ritsuki and Gouta?" Yugito asked after a while of silence. "Right here." came Gouta's voice. All four of the Jinchuuriki turned to see the tall man with the mysterious clothing and the black-haired boy.

"We should go after those two bastards." Shuuko replied clinching her fist. Just then, from the corner of her eyes, she saw Sand Village officials holding Gaara's brother on a stretcher.

"What happened?" Yugito asked. The seven went off to get the answer.

"He was poisoned by one of the people who took Gaara." A Sand Village official replied staring at all of the Jinchuuriki.


	21. The One Who Attacks with Poison

_Chapter Twenty-One: The One Who Attacks with Poison _

The seven Jinchuuriki tore off leaving the Sand Village behind. It took quite a while until they finally caught up with the two Akatsuki members.

The one known as Sasori turned around in his puppet named Hiruko. "More bugs...?" His partner turned around too. He just simply gave all of the Jinchuuriki a mere glance.

Shuuko recognized his face. "It was him!" The green-haired girl pointed at the blonde. She glanced over at the bird that hovered above the sandy ground. Gaara was lying on its back. Motionless.

"Kisame was right. All of the jinchuuriki _have _gathered together. The containers for the Nibi, Sanbi, Yonbi, Gobi, Rokubi, Shichibi, and Hachibi." The puppet nodded at each of

them in turn. Then, his eyes reverted back to Ritsuki. His jinchuuriki.

Ritsuki's face remained impassive as he stared back at the puppet.

Sasori's puppet tail fell down to the ground. "Deidara, go on ahead." The blonde turned around to flash his partner a glare. "Hey! You told me that when the Jinchuuriki's

brother came too! Hm."

"I'll be finished with them in a second." Sasori replied. Deidara gave his partner one last reluctant look and then stocked off and jumped onto his bird.

"Wait!" Shuuko attempted to run over to the blonde. Hiruko's scorpion blocked her path. Deidara flew off. Shuuko glared after him.

Just then, the tallest of all of the Jinchuuriki stepped in front of them all. "I'll fight him.

You go ahead." Without hesitation, Shuuko nodded, and the other six went off after the blonde.

Hiruko's tail hurried to block them, but instead collided with a kunai thrown by Gouta.

Gouta charged over to Hiruko while forming hand signs. The sand under the puppet

turned into water, but the puppet leaped out of the way.

Poisoned needles shot out of the puppet's mouth and began soaring through the air.

Without hesitation nor difficulty, Gouta dodged all of them.

When Gouta finally landed on the ground, he smirked under his mask. "Too easy." The

Iwa-ninja thought to himself. Then, a stabbing pain came through his back.

Hiruko stood behind him. "A simply shinobi rule. _Never_ let your enemy get behind you."


	22. Blood that Stained the Sands

_Chapter Twenty-Two: Blood that Stained the Sand_

The words rang through Gouta's ears. He slowly looked down seeing the crimson liquid staining the golden sand beneath him. Gouta fell to the ground on his face. The poison was now spreading. Luckily, it wasn't spreading quickly.

Hiruko took one last glance at the poisoned victim and turned to leave. As he dragged himself off, Gouta struggled to his feet. He dashed after the puppet-man holding a large ball of lighting in his hand.

Leaping into the air, he held the dangerous ball of lighting into the air above the puppet-man. Then, the Iwa-ninja slammed the ball down straight through the puppet. The sound of shattered wood could be heard as Gouta finally reached the ground once more. A large stain of blood took place on the side of the clothed boy. More blood stained the sand below the two.

When all of the wood finally fell off, it revealed not Sasori, but another puppet. Instead, this one looked a lot like Yuura. (the person Sasori brain-washed)

"A decoy!"

Gouta looked around for Sasori half expecting him to come out of nowhere and attack. But nothing happened except for the fact that the man fell to the ground dead. Gouta could feel the poison starting to spreading through his body.

He hurried after the group. He needed help. Fast.

* * *

A long way ahead, Deidara entered a forest close to the hideout. Emerging from the trees, came the real Hiruko.

"I need to create a new poison. One that needs more than medical ninjutsu to fix." The puppet man growled out.

Deidara stared at his partner for a while. "Those six are gaining more mileage, hm. It wouldn't be smart to lead them right to the hideout. Hm." The

blonde turned to his partner for his input. But Sasori stayed quiet.

"I'll blow it up and then we'll move to the one in the River Country, hm." Deidara replied. "You can make your poison as we leave. Hm." Sasori nodded in

response.

Soon, all six Jinchuuriki heard a colossal explosion. "What the hell was that?" Roushi turned around towards the explosion. The others shrugged.

Suddenly, Gouta arrived.

"Wow Gouta, you arrived back here in one piece." Yugito joked. She was answered by a small glare from Gouta.

"What happened?!" Shuuko rushed over to the taller boy.

"It was a decoy. The real Sasori is far ahead of us." Shuuko stared at the blood that spilled out of the boy.

Rikuto walked over to him. After performing a few hand-signs, he began healing the injury.

"I didn't know you were a medical ninja." Roushi replied looking down at the much shorter boy. "You learned that in the year that we were all separated?"

He was answered by a simple, "Hn."

After Gouta was healed, the two stood up and Rikuto spoke again. "Naruto and his team are on their way to save Gaara. There's nothing we can do now but go home."

The others nodded in response. No doubt they all felt complete and utterly useless.


	23. Time to Reminisce

_Chapter Twenty-Three: Time to Reminisce_

**Author's Note: In this chapter, it says that Sasori has died. Four days have already past. That means that Naruto's team have already come and Sakura and Chiyo have already killed Sasori. Just to make sure there's no confusion.**

**

* * *

**

No matter how fast you moved, it always took at least **four** days to make it out of Sunagakure.

When the Jinchuuriki had made it out of the Sand Village and were about to go their separate ways, Shuuko spoke up.

"Why don't we take the long way, through the sewers? We haven't seen each other in over a year so we might as well talk about what we've been doing all this time."

After the shock of walking through a sewer wore off, all of the others agreed.

* * *

_"What would the best way to capture all of those jinchuuriki be?" The Leader of the Akatsuki (also known as Pein) replied looking up at the Akatsuki members. _

_"Cornering them in a single area." Kisame replied. "Kakuzu has already sewn both of Deidara's arms back on. We're still in pretty good shape even though Sasori died. We still have Tobi."_

_Across the room, Deidara narrowed his eyes to an irritated glare. "Yeah... Tobi." Then Deidara turned his glare at Tobi. "If we all die, we'll leave everything up to the ever-so-useful Tobi, hm."_

_Tobi gushed at the so-called compliment. "Oh, senpai! Tobi didn't know you looked so highly at Tobi." _

_Deidara rolled his eyes at Tobi and then mumbled in a barley audible voice, "Jackass." _

_Pein ignored the other conversation and plowed ahead. "We'll get them all cornered and in the same spot. Then we'll take them out by force." _

* * *

All seven Jinchuuriki walked through the dark sewers listening to Gouta telling some story. However, most of them were paying more attention at how much water was getting inside their sandals.

All of a sudden, the sewer rumbled a bit. A few rocks and some debris fell from the ceiling. "What the hell was that?" Yugito asked looking upwards.

"Damn it, I wish Deidara would stop complimenting his intrusion with blowing shit up."

An unfamiliar voice replied. All of the Jinchuuriki turned to see a silver-headed man with a masked ninja by his side.

"Oh well, I guess we'll just have to capture these assholes and move on." The silver-head rubbed the back of his neck, and then a smirk appeared on his face. All of a sudden, the two began running at top speed over to the group of bewildered jinchuuriki.

In seconds, the two groups were playing a game of capture.

"Who the hell are they?!" Shuuko asked frantically looking over her shoulder multiple times as she ran. That's when she noticed they had on the same coats as the Uchiha and the shark man that was chasing them before.

"They're from the Akatsuki." Rikuto replied pointing out the obvious.

"Pick up the pace, Kakuzu!" The silver-headed one yelled looking over his shoulder at his partner. He was answered by silence, but eventually, his partner caught up.

"It would be stupid to continue running in a group like this. Split up!" Ritsuki replied, and the seven did just that.

The Akatsuki members skidded to a stop making water ripple and splash as they did.

"Damn it. That means we'll have to split up too." In an instant, the two Akatsuki members were separated each going in different directions.

* * *

Elsewhere in the sewer, where Ritsuki was located, someone was already waiting for him. He skidded to a stop in front of a figure that sat on a white bird.

"That's as far as you'll go, hm." The figure known as Deidara smirked at the black-haired boy. Ritsuki dashed off heading in the opposite direction instead of confronting him. Deidara went right on after him.

* * *

Roushi tore through the lower part of the sewer where it was the darkest. He was met with a giant, falling in front of him. "Lucky me, I meet up with my very own jinchuuriki." The same shark-like man stepped forward, grinning from ear to ear.

"Oh shit." Roushi cursed to himself. "There's no way we'll get out of here without fighting." Roushi told himself taking out a kunai.


	24. To Each His Own Battle

_Chapter Twenty-Four: To Each His Own Battle _

Heavily panting as she ran, Shuuko bolted through the jet-black sewer kicking up water with her heels. She was currently being pursued by someone who, well, she wasn't completely sure what he looked like yet. It was way to dark to tell.

Cursing as she ran, Shuuko turned a corner and continued running- or at least tried to.

Her pursuer had caught her foot, keeping her from running any further.

Shuuko glanced down at her leg. It was caught by a strange grayish-black tendril. Gasping loudly; Shuuko feel into the emetic water below her, landing hard. She began sputtering and splashing in an attempt at trying to get away. But the attempt proved unsuccessful. That just got her in an even more complicated mess with the tendril. This time, it was tied tightly around her neck.

Slowly but surely, the girl was being pulled closer and closer to her captor, but even worse than that, she was almost without air.

* * *

Perfect, just perfect. Two ninja that used fire element. One chasing the other. And even worse than that, the one chasing her was an Uchiha. Just perfect.

Yugito made it just in time behind the corner of the wall before an enormous ball of fire blew past. She planted her back against the wall and began panting hard. This game of cat and mouse was getting very tiring, especially since she was the mouse.

After performing a few hand signs, Yugito blew out a huge fireball in response to Itachi's. Once all of the smoke had cleared, she noticed the Uchiha was nowhere to be found.

A sigh of relief escaped Yugito's mouth, but she had called it quits a little too early. A flash flew from behind her binding her arms down.

She could feel the icy cold metal blade close to her neck. Her breath had stopped. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see that Sharingan. Yugito bit her lip.

_"Oh, shit." _

* * *

Elsewhere, Rikuto was already in a head-to-head battle against Hidan. Surprisingly, the blonde-haired boy was incredibly fast, despite his height. His power to keep up with the thrusts of Hidan's scythe was incredible.

Rikuto extended his arm, the virescent staff still in his hand. It wasn't long before the two went at it again, slashing at each other almost effortlessly. The loud clangs rang throughout the sewer as the two proceeded in their battle.

* * *

Killer Bee was left with Konan. Konan watched the Jinchuuriki make a joke about her hair and then write the line down in a book. She didn't even bother attacking him at that point.

Once Killer Bee had hid the book back in a pocket, he attacked. He was on offense, Konan on defense. Their positions soon changed when Konan threw out about twenty shuriken. Believing them to be real shuriken, Killer Bee dodged. But missed one.

Looking at his arm, he figured out the shuriken were made of paper! He glanced upward and found that Konan had attacked again. Several feign shuriken were hurling through the air. Effortlessly, Killer Bee blocked them all with the blade of only one sword. Smirking to himself, he commented that the attack was pitiful.

Konan, being a master at masking her feelings and emotions, didn't show her anger or disdain for this Jinchuuriki. Konan quickly changed from mid-range to long-range and dashed over to Killer Bee with her paper spear, ready to attack.

* * *

Gouta was battling the last Akatsuki member, Pein. All of Pein's six bodies stood waiting for Gouta to attack.

Gouta made the first move with a ball of lighting in his hand. The body known as Deva Path rose one arm, without any movement whatsoever, he sent Gouta flying backwards.

Gouta landed with his face planted into the ground.

"What the hell was that?" The masked Jinchuuriki looked up at Deva Path's body standing in front of him.

* * *

Rikuto and Hidan were still battling face-to-face. The thing was, Rikuto was fighting two battles. One with Hidan, and one with his bijuu.

**"You're going to die here, kid. I can't wait until it happens, but you're going to die here. Your corpse is going to be taken back to the Akatsuki base and I'm going to finally be free!" **The Sanbi growled at Rikuto.

The shortest Jinchuuriki failed to ignore the turtle-like demon. "I'm _not_ going to die here. Shut up!" He moved to dodge Hidan once more.

"Damn it, you make this game so boring." Hidan snickered glaring at Rikuto. "I can't really show you what I'm made of because we're in this stupid sewer, but if I could you'd already be dead." Hidan rose his scythe up and slashed Rikuto's shoulder with it.

Vermillion streaks of blood collided with the water turning it red. Hidan let out a low chuckle. _"His moves are getting slower. This is perfect." _Hidan looked down at the water. If only they weren't fighting in a _sewer_ of all places. Any blood would wash away in an instant.

He'd just have to lead him to a dry area. But what dry area was in a sewer? Oh well, he'd just kill him quickly. By slashing him to bits.

Hidan's scythe slashed forward almost pinning Rikuto to the wall behind him. If the boy hadn't ducked, he would have been finished.

**"You **_**are**_** going to die here. Deny it all you want. I've always told you the truth and you know I have. You **_**will**_** die here. Whether you like it or not." **

* * *

**Author's Note: Onto the questions....**

**Question from Elemental Dragon Swordman: **Where's Naruto!?!?

**Answer: Naruto is taking Gaara back to Sunagakure with Sakura, Kakashi, and the others. Naruto will show up more later on, he doesn't show up in the sewer part though. But there is something important that happens around here. **

**darkpit was confused with who's who. Here's a quick summary of all of the Jinchuuriki.... (you most likely already know the One-tails and the Nine-tails)**

**Two Tails (Nibi): Nii Yugito Village: Lighting Country**

**Three Tails (Sanbi): Rikuto Village: Water Country**

**Four Tails (Yonbi): Roushi Village: Earth Country **

**Five Tails (Gobi): Gouta Village: Earth Country**

**Six Tails (Rokubi): Ritsuki Village: Hot Spring Country**

**Seven Tails (Shichibi): Shuuko Village: Waterfall Village**

**Eight Tails (Hachibi): Killer Bee Village: Lighting Country**

**Please let me know if that helps! **


	25. Fire VS Fire: Creates a Bigger Flame

_Chapter Twenty-Five: Fire VS Fire: Creates a Bigger Flame_

Yugito stood helplessly with her back turned towards Itachi. The cold metal of the kunai brushing against her neck. Her breath was caught in her throat and she tried so hard not to move. Yugito rose her leg to kick Itachi quickly, but Itachi dodged pulling away from her. Once he had turned around, he noticed the blonde woman was gone. Itachi turned away and searched around for the woman. It didn't take long for him to see she was hiding above him.

Orange fireballs flew from the ceiling. Itachi simply dodged all of the fireballs and kept his eyes on where she was going. "I'm not going to give up easily, you know." Yugito stopped running circles in the water and flashed the Uchiha a grin. "You may be here for a very, very, long time."

Itachi didn't reply. Instead he began walking towards her at a very slow pace. Slowly, Yugito began hearing other footsteps approaching her. The sound of splashes doubled and tripled. She was soon surrounded by about twenty clones of Itachi. Great; now she had to find the real Uchiha, destroy all of the clones, and watch out for the Sharingan.

All of the clones stood ready for her to attack. Yugito masked her panic perfectly with a smile. "You know, all I have to do is use a fireball technique and you're all finished." She was again ignored by Itachi. Yugito performed the needed hand seals and blew and an enormous fireball. No one could get away.

Suddenly, everything reversed. Yugito saw the fireball instead rushing towards _her_. "What the-" The jonin's voice was cut off as she practically collided with the fire.

The blonde woman looked up from the ground. Her pale skin now darkened to the dark maroon red of the burn."How the hell did my technique backfire?" Yugito looked around at herself and then up at one Itachi who was standing in front of her.

"You looked at my Sharingan." Itachi replied emotionlessly.

"Never! I never did! I made sure I didn't!" Yugito lashed out. And then she remembered.

_(A/N: If you don't remember, it was in the previous chapter. When Itachi had the kunai planted close to Yugito's neck. Remember this?... _

**"**She could feel the icy cold metal blade close to her neck. Her breath had stopped. **Out of the corner of her eye, she could see that Sharingan. **Yugito bit her lip.**"**_) _

"Damn it all." Yugito cursed herself. Soon enough, she found herself in a strange dark red realm.

Again and again, the scene of a pike being slashed through her played over and over in her mind. In the real world, Yugito was now hurled over into a ball screaming in horror.

Her bloodcurdling screams rose throughout the entire sewer as she continued experiencing Tsukuyomi herself.

* * *

Shuuko's face was flushed completely. She had lost practically all air and was now almost dead. Kakuzu lifted her up from the water, his hand had a tight firm around her neck.

Shuuko opened her eyes which were now slits. She barely saw the face in front of her, but she was met with blood-red and green eyes. Her hands slowly rose to pull Kakuzu's hands off of her, but he didn't budge.

"Pathetic." Kakuzu said in his low voice. He turned around and began walking away from the area keeping a firm grip on Shuuko's neck.

Shuuko proceeded to kicked the man but that didn't work at all. She reached her hands up and slipped the large red sack from her shoulders. Kakuzu's gaze turned towards her a little too late and the sack collided _hard_ with his face.

Shuuko fell to the ground coughing and sputtering. Kakuzu spun around. What the hell was in that sack?

Shuuko looked up quickly. She jumped out of the way as Kakuzu lashed out at her. She threw two kunai with exploding tags at him, but when the smoke cleared. He was undamaged. Her mouth fell open as she saw his body had turned all black.

_Earth element. _Shuuko grinned at the stitched nin in front of her. "This is going to be easy." Shuuko stood up slowly from her hunched over position.

"So you have earth element. Well... guess what." A sly look lined Shuuko's face. "Do you know what beats out earth?"

Kakuzu ignored her question. He obviously knew that she was a simpleton and was trying to amaze him by telling him the answer. He was a shinobi, _and _an Akatsuki member. He had been around _much_ longer than she had.

"'Just'ta let'cha know," Shuuko smirked mischievously. "I have lighting element. If you were smart, you'd know that lighting beats earth hands down!"

Kakuzu rolled his eyes. Instead, he proceeded to unleashing the masks that were on stitched to his back.

Shuuko watched in horror as the masks on his back spurted out and in front of her and stood as four black monsters.

Shuuko's face fell as she looked at the creatures in front of her, Kakuzu included.

"I'm screwed."

* * *

The Deva Path body kicked Gouta sending him farther backwards. The masked shinobi hit the wall again and began coughing hard. A light pink bruise took possession on his cheekbone. A scar took possession on the other cheek.

The Deva Path took another step closer to Gouta, but the Iwagakure ninja placed both hands on the water sending a large wave at the six bodies. They were forced to scatter.

Gouta sighed in relief; what he didn't know was that another of Pein's bodies was behind him.

The body known as Asura Path, rose both its arms to crush the Gobi jinchuuriki. In a second, Gouta dodged the body.

The Asura Path body stood across from Gouta; the body shot off it's arm like a projectile using it to attack.

* * *

Ritsuki continued running throughout the sewer, abruptly turning different corners and dodging shuriken that were being thrown at him every few seconds. A fresh new group of the silver shuriken propelled through the air at lighting speed. It would have been a perfect shot if the shuriken were going in the right direction, and if Ritsuki wasn't dodging.

He could hear Deidara's voice echoing behind him. "Damn it Tobi, stop! Hm. You're throwing them all wrong. Hm."

"But Deidara-senpai, Tobi needs to practice his aim!" Tobi pleaded defensively.

Deidara rolled his eyes and smacked his team member on the head. "Why are you so useless? Hm."

Ritsuki could barley catch their ends of the petty argument that was forming as he ran. He rolled his eyes and turned the next corner just to have something explode in his face.

* * *

**Question from Elemental Dragon Swordman: So all of the jinchuuriki except Naruto and Gaara are gonna get captured?**

**Answer: Maybe.... (I don't want to spoil anything) But, I will tell you that they will not all be captured all together. Not right away either. **

**Question from Elemental Dragon Swordman: Did Gaara's bijuu get taken out already?**

**Answer: Yes. It is already sealed inside the King of Hell statue. **


	26. Bloody Paper, Bloody Sword

_Chapter Twenty-Six: Bloody Paper, Bloody Sword_

Konan and Killer Bee were battling head-to-head with one another. Killer Bee using one of his swords, Konan with a paper spear.

_"How can a spear made of paper work so well?" _Killer Bee thought to himself as both of their weapons clashed again. The two broke apart and Killer Bee swung his sword at the blue-haired woman's feet. She leaped into the air to dodge. Killer Bee perked up.

_"An opening!" _He thrusts out his sword stabbing Konan straight through the heart. A smirk pulled at the ends of his lips. But the Konan before him spread apart bursting into a million white butterflies.

_"What the __hell__?!" _Behind him, butterflies mashed together creating another Konan. The spear was tightened in her hand. Raising the weapon up, Konan stabbed the tan-skinned man through the back.

The body burst into a puff of smoke. "A clone." Konan jerked her head around, her eyes frantically searching for the jinchuuriki. The blue-haired woman jerked her head to look behind her. All eight swords rushed towards her at astounding speed.

_"Oh __shit__!" _Every sword pined Konan to the wall behind her. From the ceiling, the jinchuuriki fell in front of her.

"Game over."

* * *

Deidara jolted his head to the side at where the explosion had occurred. "Don't tell me he fell for that lame trick!" The enormous bird flew in that direction. As soon as they turned the corner, in a quick movement, the bird was pinned to the wall.

Deidara landed on the ground safely after dodging the attack. Looking up, he saw Ritsuki in front of him. His had extended his right arm and then held his wrist with his left arm.

Deidara looked down at himself. He was inside a large bubble.

_"What the hell?!" _Then the blonde smirked. _"He's going to keep me in this bubble for as long as I can last, hm. When I finally lose all air, I'll die. Smart." _

But instead of what the Iwa nin predicted, Ritsuki began scrunching the fingers of his right hand closer and tighter into a fist.

Deidara felt himself squishing closer together. The bubble was getting smaller and smaller.

_"__Damn it.__ I can't move, hm." _

"Deidara-senpai! Oh no!! Don't die on me Deidara-senpai!!" Tobi exclaimed from the sidelines.

Ritsuki barley glanced at him before continuing to squeeze Deidara tighter and tighter together.

What Ritsuki didn't know, was that the bird that lay disregarded to the side, had begun to move. It seemed to be puffing up more and more. As if it were ready to explode.

* * *

Roushi looked up at the shark man in front of him. The blue man chuckled evilly as he removed the sword from his back. "I'll rip you limb from limb!" He swung the sword downwards to hit Roushi. The man jumped out of the way avoiding it.

Roushi performed a few hand seals creating a wall of hardened lava. Kisame's sword slashed right through it. The broken bits of the wall fell off into the water.

"You're not going to get away." Kisame leaped at the maroon-haired man. Roushi quickly dodged the man with ease but landed less gracefully than he had planned.

Quickly, the maroon-haired man created another wall of lava. This time, not at all hardened. Kisame tried slashing his sword through it, just to get it stuck. Slowly, the sword began melting away.

Kisame's eyes widened just as Roushi kicked him straight across the face. Kisame pulled away from his sword that was slowly being melted away.

He quickly began conducting a series of seven hand seals. _"I'll have to defeat him with water jutsu then."_

The sewer water began creating a water shark. The shark charged forward attacking Roushi. Roushi bounded out of the way and into the air. _"This is perfect. If he's using water jutsu, than I'll just have to use earth to take him out." _


	27. Prophesy Unheard

_Chapter Twenty-Seven: Prophecy Unheard _

Hidan and Rikuto were still in the same battle as before. Slashing at one another with their weapons. Nothing much had changed. Except for the fact that the Sanbi was still bothering Rikuto with his warning.

**"I can't wait till you feel ****hell's**** dark embrace. Till you feel the coldness of death around you. Till you breath your very last breath. Where the blood will stop flowing, and I will finally be free. I've been waiting for more than a decade to be free. Now I will finally get my chance." **

Rikuto swung hard at Hidan in anger. Shut up! In return, Hidan slashed his scythe at the lime-haired boy scratching his cheek.

The ruby colored liquid cascaded down the short boy's cheek. At the moment, Hidan screamed with laughter. _"With how slow he's moving, all just stab him as many times as I have to to kill him." _

Rikuto placed a hand on his cheek but as he did, Hidan swung his scythe at the boy again. The blade connected with the jinchuuriki's arm. Blood hit the water turning an area of it bloodshot.

_"__Damn it__." _Rikuto cursed himself as he clutched his arm.

The Sanbi smiled at himself.

**"What did I tell ya?" **

* * *

Balls of fire, lighting, and water flew through the air crashing through almost every wall.

Shuuko jumped from wall to wall dodging the attacks as quickly as she could. Taking a kunai out from her back pocket, she flung the weapon through the air at one of the four monsters chasing her.

The monster blowing fire melted the kunai right away and continued chasing after the girl.

_"__Damn!__ I don't stand a chance like this!" _Shuuko dodged the water bullets that were thrown at her and then continued running through the sewers. She turned and continued running down the mucky sewer as fast as she could. Performing hand seals as she ran, Shuuko hand soon became a strike of lighting.

She plunged the hand into the water creating a mountainous waterfall coming towards the masks.

"That will hold them for a while." Shuuko turned around and turned a corner away from the area.

* * *

The bleached bird behind Ritsuki grew larger and larger. The jinchuuriki, however, didn't seem to notice. His hand began clenching closer and closer into a fist.

When his hand was finally balled into a fist, bubble exploded discharging water. The limbs of the prisoner flew to the ground. However, there wasn't any any bloodshed. Every one of the limbs dispersed into clouds of smoke. The jinchuuriki boy jerked his head to look behind him where the bird was. Behind him, the real blonde emerged from the bird, kunai in hand.

Within seconds, Ritsuki had a kunai out and blocked the bomber's attack. The blonde jumped out of the bird and attacked the jinchuuriki again. They continued like that for a while. Finally, the kunai was knocked out of the Akatsuki member's hand. The two proceeded to hand to hand combat. Using the boy's kunai against him, Deidara stabbed the boy through the stomach.

The body burst into a million medium-sized bubbles that floated away in seconds. Deidara inspected the area for the real body. Ritsuki emerged from the water. Deidara smirked at him.

_'What are you going to try this time?'_

* * *

Konan struggled to abscond from the swords that held her down. A huge grin crept over Killer Bee's face. Finally, she was pinned down. Suddenly, a different voice filled the jinchuuriki's ears.

**"Aren't you going to finish her off?" **The Hachibi asked suspiciously. Killer Bee didn't answer. Instead he slowly began walking over to his prisoner. In his head, however, he was trying to come up with a new line for a poem. Slowly, the jinchuuriki tugged one of the eight sword's from the blue-haired woman's arm. He rose the blade over Konan's head, prepared to slash straight through her head.

An ear-piercing yell hit the entire sewer. Pebbles plummeted from the ceiling and plopped in the water below. "What's going on?" Killer Bee jerked his head around. He accidently released the sword from his grip, and the weapon fell through the air, making a large bloody scar down the side of Konan's face.

"What is that?" Killer Bee asked a similar question to the one before. The Hachibi took awhile to answer, but finally, he did. **"A bijuu. It's being let loose." **


	28. Opened Cages and Broken Seals

_Chapter Twenty-Eight: Opened Cages and Broken Seals_

"What do you mean a bijuu is being let loose?!" Killer Bee's eyes widened. "Who?" The jinchuuriki asked his bijuu.

Konan looked up from the wall. Was this man really talking to his bijuu as calm as he was? She shook the thought off. Instead, her mind switched to thinking of a plan to get herself free from the wall.

**"You can find out later!" **The Hachibi growled. **"For now, just finish her off." **Killer Bee looked back up at Konan. He twirled the sword in his hand so the blade was pointing towards her. Then, he dashed over to her, sword ready.

He plunged the sword into the woman's stomach. However, she didn't move. The woman slowly turned into a small paper airplane. The airplane fell into the water, soaked.

**"She has retreated." **The Hachibi told Killer Bee. The man didn't care, instead, he ran off to the other side of the sewer to see what the hell was going on.

* * *

Roushi looked furiously for a patch of earth, any kind of earth. It was his key to killing this guy.

Kisame was throwing an indefinite amount of water balls at the jinchuuriki he was after. _'If I just keep him cornered, then he'll have no time to try an earth technique on me.'_ The shark-looking man decided.

Roushi turned a corner just as an idea hit him. He could crumble part of the ceiling. In one quick movement, the maroon-haired man threw a kunai up at the ceiling. The weapon was attached to an explosive tag.

At the last minute, Kisame noticed the explosive tag.

_'Oh, __shit__!' _

At that moment, a colossal mountain of rocks fell from the ceiling burying Kisame underneath them.

Roushi looked behind the corner he was hiding behind. A sigh of relief escaped his mouth. Finally, the battle was over. Just as he was about to leave, another mountain of rocks fell from the ceiling.

The maroon-haired man just barley dodged the rockslide, but when he looked up, he saw the mountain wasn't as big.

"What's going on?" The man asked himself. Suddenly, splashes indicating footsteps could be heard coming closer. Roushi looked up to see Killer Bee rushing towards him.

Roushi repeated his question to Killer Bee. "A bijuu is being let loose." Killer Bee told the other man. Roushi's mouth fell open. "Who?! How could this happen?!" The maroon-haired man asked the other.

Killer Bee simply shrugged and the two men ran off.

* * *

The arm soared through the air towards Gouta. The man just barely dodged the projectile in time.

_'I'll have to finish this fight soon.' _Gouta thought to himself lifting his head slightly. Suddenly, both of the two fighters heard and felt rumbling.

A few pebbles rumbled from the ceiling and dropped into the water. "What's going on?" One of Pein's bodies asked the other.

No one answered, but the Deva Path's body walked forward. Gouta's eyes widened.

_'Strong chakra... Incredibly strong chakra.' _The masked boy lifted himself from the ground and dashed off out of the area. All six bodies were left behind.

The Deva Path looked after Gouta. "Go after him."

In an instant, the six were gone in a flash after Gouta.


	29. Odds and Ends

_Chapter Twenty-Nine: Odds and Ends_

Deidara looked up at the boy in front of him. He was entirely different from before. The water beneath the three males splashed against the walls violently. The current was so strong that it knocked the orange-masked Akatsuki member off his feet.

A smirk pulled at the blonde's lips. His sapphire eyes brightened at the intriguing scene in front of him. Even if the blonde's lock of hair was covering his left eye, he could see the jinchuuriki clearly in front of him.

Before, they had proceeded to taijutsu. The jinchuuriki's skills were ones that won acclaim for his deftness in taijutsu. However, he wasn't as strong at controlling his bijuu.

Deidara stared at the suffering jinchuuriki in him. He could tell a battle was going on between the kid and his beast.

The blonde's smirk expanded. _'He can't control the Rokubi at all, hm. That's a pretty scary thought. That means the demon can break loose whenever it wants, hm.' _Deidara thought to himself.

Ritsuki on the other hand, had fallen on his knees. One hand was placed on the right half of his face, concealing the half that the Rokubi had taken over.

Tobi walked next to Deidara and stared at the black-haired boy in front of them.

"What's going on, Deidara-senpai?" Tobi asked as he watched a golden tail made of chakra release from the boy. However, Deidara didn't answer. He was too intrigued by the sight before him.

Tobi tried another question. "What bijuu does this jinchuuriki have?" Deidara finally noticed Tobi's voice. A malicious smirk spread across his face. "The Rokubi, hm."

_**_**_

Inside the cage, midnight blue eyes looked out from behind trapped bars. Deeper inside the cage, something slithered by. The same slithering object hit against the wall behind the demon. The slithering object revealed to be tails, six tails.

The tails soared high into the air and then back down again. The demon licked its lips impatiently. **"It won't take long before this seal breaks. Poor kid, he never really knew how to maintain it anyway." **

The demon smiled widely revealing fangs. **"Stupid brat." **

* * *

Shuuko rushed through the dark sewer searching for someone, anyone. She stopped dead in her tracks when she heard Yugito's scream. Her face lost a little of its color. Yugito sounded as if she were in pain.

Said blonde screamed once again, this time louder than before. "What's going on?" Shuuko wondered aloud to herself. Just as she prepared to take off again, the sound of electrical surges got closer.

"Oh shit not again. That was way too fast!" The green-haired girl thought back to whom exactly her opponent was. An Akatsuki member, and a very skilled one at that. As Shuuko stopped to think, the wall to her right crumbled.

Jerking her head to the side, the celadon-haired girl saw the fire mask waiting for her.

Without warning, it blew out a large whirl of orange-red fire. At the last minute, Shuuko hid behind a wall. Panting hard, she listened closely to hear if the mask was still there.

Beads of swear fell from her forehead, her heart felt as if it were ready to explode. She wanted to sink straight into the floor as the thought that there were still three other masks and the controller of them still waiting for her.

She continued to listen closely to the noises she was waiting to hear. Instead, she was greeted by silence. Shuuko jumped to her feet and dashed over to where she had heard Yugito's voice coming from.

She saw Yugito with an absolutely mortified look on her face. Her skin was bright white, (save the scattered maroon burns) her eyes seemed as if they were pried open, and her mouth was opened wide.

Itachi looked down at the woman, and suddenly came into motion again. He reached down for her, but a fist came at him all of a sudden. The onyx-haired man looked up at the girl who had assaulted him.

"Stay away from her." The threat slurred together through Shuuko's gritted teeth. He saw her fist tightened incredibly tight. Her eyes were dark despite their supposedly bright hue.

Itachi stared at the girl, his face expressionless. The green-haired girl lunged at the Uchiha again just as another wall broke down. All four masks stood by Kakuzu. Shuuko stopped abruptly. Her gaze drifted from one Akatsuki to the other, then down at a fallen Yugito.

"Two against one aren't very good odds."


	30. Rokubi and Sanbi Unleashed!

_Chapter Thirty: Rokubi and Sanbi Unleashed!_

_Note: Raiton means lighting element_

_Katon means fire element_

* * *

Shuuko stood looking from one Akatsuki member to the other. Then her gaze drifted down to a fallen Yugito. That was when Kakuzu's Raiton mask jumped forward. Opening its mouth, a huge bolt of lighting flew out towards Shuuko.

Shuuko was cornered on the other side as well with the fire mask spilling out a ball of fire at her. Shuuko jumped out of the way with Yugito under her arm. She attached herself to the wall using chakra.

"Yugito?! What is wrong with you? Get up!" The girl slapped the woman a few times but that was again a failed attempt. The katon and raiton masks connected to one another, this time, they mixed both the fire and lighting outbursts together creating a much bigger fire than before.

This time, Shuuko didn't dodge in time. Throwing Yugito down to the water, Shuuko took the hit and hurled onto the ground. Her face a little darkened from the burn.

"Ouch dammit." Shuuko lifted her head from the ground and saw the two combined masks in front of her. They attacked again, this time, Shuuko dodging the attack. "Damn, Yugito!! Get the hell up, I need you!"

Shuuko jumped to dodge the attack again, this time, she bumped straight into Itachi's chest. She stopped abruptly and turned around to see Itachi staring down at her. His red Sharingan spinning.

Suddenly, Shuuko noticed her eyes had met his. She jumped to cover her eyes, but it was too late. She soon found herself in the dark hell that Yugito had been put through. This time, perfected for her.

* * *

Gouta hurried down the pitch-black sewer. It seemed as if it were a hallway or even an aisle. He couldn't see a single thing, and it seemed as if the room was larger than it really was. The echoes of his sandals splashing the unpalatable water and the sound of his shallow breathing were louder than usual.

Every little noise could be heard. Suddenly, a series of _other _footsteps hit Gouta's ears. He stopped directly in his tracks and turned around. Nothing. He couldn't see a single thing.

Everything was dark and silent. Shrugging, the boy began running again. At that moment, a sharp pain hit him in the back. He heard something drop into the water and could smell the undeniable scent of blood. Fresh blood.

The boy reached over to his back. A kunai stuck out from it. After pulling it out, he dropped it into the water. Those six bodies, they must have been following him. But how could they attack witch such accuracy?! And in the dark as well!

Gouta lifted a leg to move again but he felt five other sharp jolts of pain go through him. They hit all different spots of the body. Five _chakra_ points.

The masked shinobi wasn't worried, he still had fifty-nine undamaged points left to attack with. But his opponent's accuracy was dead scary so he'd have to be careful. Gouta ran off down the pathway once more.

This time, something a lot bigger than a kunai hit his back. A demon wind shuriken. Suddenly, the secret became clear to the jinchuuriki.

The six bodies had amazing accuracy because they could hear his footsteps and could sense his chakra. Gouta himself could sense chakra, but it was coming from six different directions. He didn't know who was throwing what. He also couldn't feel the weapon coming closer because of all of the heavy clothing he was wrapped in.

Using his chakra, Gouta attached himself to the ceiling. This wouldn't mask his chakra, but it would make it a little bit harder for them to attack him. Gouta vanished into thin air from ear and eyeshot of all of Pein's bodies.

Finally, the Gobi jinchuuriki entered a brighter part of the sewer. Far ahead, he caught sight of Killer Bee and Roushi. It didn't take long for the young man to catch up.

"What's going on?" The tallest jinchuuriki asked the others. Killer Bee and Roushi didn't stop running. "A bijuu is being let loose." Roushi answered.

Gouta's eyes widened for a few seconds. Then his head jerked forward. "Just as I thought."

* * *

Rikuto hit the ground with a large thud. His body was covered with red scars and scratches. A long scar appeared across his pale cheek. Blood began spewing out like a waterfall.

Hidan stood before the kid. Lifting his leg, the white-haired man kicked the jinchuuriki in the chest. The kids landed on his back. Hidan placed the same kicking leg on top of Rikuto's chest. He looked down at the helpless kid. "You're almost at the end of your rope aren't you?"

Rikuto's lack of an answer resulted to Hidan's expression change. "Say something you stupid motherfucker!"

Hidan mashed his foot down harder onto Rikuto chest. He picked his foot up and began stamping the kid into the ground. The pressure increased with each stomp. A hole took place on Rikuto's shirt. Just then, Hidan noticed the kid's eyes were completely closed.

A grin appeared on his face. "Heh, pathetic." The Jashinist turned around and bent down to pick his scythe off the ground. With an extended hand, Hidan took hold of the weapon. But as he rolled himself back up, he heard the splashes of water behind him.

Hidan turned around towards the kid.

Rikuto's eyes had changed to be bloodshot and an immense amount of chakra leaked from his body. Hidan's hot pink eyes widened at the sight. Just as the jinchuuriki stood up, all three tails sprang out of him.

Instead of a face of terror and perturbation, a smirk took place on Hidan's face. He jumped out of the way just as all three, green tails lunged for him.

Hidan landed safely a whiles away from Rikuto.

_'So this is the Sanbi.' _


	31. Jinchuuriki Tears

_Chapter Thirty-One: Jinchuuriki Tears_

_Note: Suiton means Water Element _

_Fuuton means Wind Element_

_

* * *

_

One after one, eight bodies fell to the ground. Blood splattered against Shuuko's shirt. Then the crimson liquid stained the ground. That was all of them. Shuuko looked at the corpses beneath her.

Naruto, Gaara, Yugito, Gouta, Killer Bee, Rikuto, Roushi, _Ritsuki_. All dead. And it was all because they were jinchuuriki. Shuuko's eyes widened at the sight before her. The Akatsuki had captured and killed every last one of her friends.

The scarlet-eyed girl fell onto her knees. Her celadon-colored hair fell over her face. Slowly but surely, tears rushed down her tan cheeks. How could this have happened?

Just then, Shuuko felt a nice, hard smack across her cheek.

She was immediately knocked out of the genjutsu. Rubbing her face, Shuuko looked over at a smiling Yugito. "What the hell was that for?! You didn't 'have'ta _hit_ me!" Shuuko spat out glaring at the blonde woman.

"Sorry but it was the only thing I could do to get you out of the genjutsu." Shuuko blinked a few times. "Then how'd _you_ get out?" Yugito pointed at the Katon mask with her thumb. "Whatever that thing is, it stepped on me." Shuuko stared at the mask, then turned back to Yugito.

"How the hell are we going to get away from them?" Shuuko jerked her head to Yugito. The blonde girl stood up and looked at all six of the enemies, masks included. "I'll tell you what to do, just follow my lead." Yugito said, her lips barely moving.

Shuuko hesitated awhile and then nodded. After a moment of planning, the two broke apart. Shuuko running one way, Yugito the other. Yugito performed a few hand seals and then blew out a large ball of fire. The attack was aimed at the Katon and Raiton masks.

The Suiton mask jumped in front of the two and blocked the attack with a blast of water. From behind, Shuuko slashed through the Suiton mask with a kunai. The mask melted into a pile of black mush.

Shuuko looked up from the ground. This time, she was met with another mask. It didn't look familiar either. Before Shuuko could do anything, the Fuuton mask blew her straight into the wall behind her.

Before it could attack again, Yugito fell in between the two. The Katon and Raiton masks following her. Seeing that Yugito was cornered, all three masks released their elements from their mouths.

Yugito connected herself to the ceiling as both mask's elements collided burning one another out. The Katon and Raiton masks crumbled into black piles of mush. The Fuuton mask was the only one left.

"Only three left." At that moment, however, Gouta, Roushi, and Killer Bee came into view.

"Retreat." Both Itachi and Kakuzu were ordered by Pein. The two obeyed orders and disappeared into thin air. The three piles of mush and the Fuuton mask disappeared as well.

Shuuko got up from the ground. "What's going on?" Roushi shook his head. "No time to explain. Just hurry up." The five ran off through the sewer.

"Where's Ritsuki?!" Shuuko exclaimed looking at Roushi. "We're looking for him right now." Killer Bee responded instead. Yugito flashed a quick glare at Shuuko for her lack of remembering the other jinchuuriki.

"Where's Rikuto?" Yugito asked. "We're looking for him too." Gouta answered. The five turned a corner. Closer and closer, they came towards the area where Ritsuki was located.

_

* * *

_

Two more tails came out from Ritsuki. At last, Deidara had finally stood up. Tobi was already backed far away from the jinchuuriki.

"S-senpai, shouldn't we be going?!" Tobi whimpered just as he realized he had ran into the wall. Before Deidara could answer, he heard the leader's voice. "Retreat."

Deidara's eyes widened. "You're kidding me?! What about the jinchuuriki, hm?!" "You're almost out of chakra, am I correct?" A pout crossed over Deidara's face but he didn't answer.

"Hidan and Kakuzu will be staying behind." The voice replied. Deidara sighed and just as he turned to leave, the other five jinchuuriki walked into the area.

"You're not going anywhere." Yugito told the other blonde. Deidara just smirked back at her. After creating a simple hand sign, both Deidara and Tobi disappeared leaving only smoke behind.

All of the jinchuuriki looked over at Ritsuki. Shuuko gasped and then hurried forward. "Don't." A large hand was placed on her shoulder. Shuuko looked over at Roushi.

"Then what are we supposed to do?" Shuuko asked glaring at the Yonbi jinchuuriki. In a second, Killer Bee appeared behind Ritsuki. In one swift movement, he punched the black-haired boy knocking him unconscious.

Shuuko's mouth dropped open. "It was _that_ easy?!" Killer Bee flashed her a smile. "Well, when you have another jinchuuriki with a stronger bijuu inside him...." Shuuko rushed over to Killer Bee completely ignoring what he was saying.

"Is he okay?! Is he going to turn back to normal?!" The frantic girl asked Killer Bee. However, Roushi answered instead. "He's fine and his appearance is already back to normal." All of three golden tails dispersed and the chakra disappeared.

The scarlet-eyed girl sighed with relief. Yugito rolled her eyes. "Aren't we missing someone?" The jinchuuriki looked back up. Killer Bee held Ritsuki under his arm and then all of the jinchuuriki headed off.

_

* * *

_

Hidan was grinning from ear-to-ear. He looked down at the bloody gash through his stomach. "I guess you're not as boring as I thought you'd be. Well, when you're like this that is."

Rikuto ignored the white-haired man. Instead, he walked closer towards him. With only one swat of a tail, Hidan was thrown against the wall behind him. He lifted up his thumb and wiped the blood away from the side of his mouth.

Rikuto took one more step closer to Hidan. All of a sudden, the Sanbi's voice rang through Rikuto's ears. The same things he had told Rikuto early about his death. Inside him, the Sanbi demanded that he be let free.

The voice echoed loudly. Soon, Rikuto lost it completely. The seal was slowly breaking and the cage was sedately opening. Blood began rushing out of Rikuto's limbs. One by one, his bones began breaking, and his chakra system died completely.

Many squirts of blood plunged into the water. That was when every wall in that area broke down. It seemed as if out of thin air, but right in front of Hidan stood the Sanbi.

The green turtle demon stood looking down with its bloodshot red eyes. It let a loud scream. At that moment, Rikuto fell into the water on his back. That was when the jinchuuriki stumbled upon the sight.

"What. The. Hell. Happened?" Yugito's mouth fell straight open. The other jinchuuriki hurried over to a fallen Rikuto. The body was motionless and his eyes were closed.

Gouta checked for a pulse. "Is he dead?" Roushi asked Gouta. Gouta said nothing. Shuuko placed a hand over her mouth. Before anyone could speak, everyone felt rumbling.

They looked over at the Sanbi. It was making its way off to some other area. And it was moving pretty fast too. "Um.... are we going to do anything about that?" Yugito asked the others. Shuuko stood up but she was stopped by the answer of a familiar voice.

"Don't go after it. Let the Akatsuki capture it." Rikuto said in a low, barely audible voice. "But..." The words slid off of Shuuko's lips. "The rest of you better not die.... or else you'll really be in an utter... hell..."

With that, Rikuto closed his eyes and his breathing stopped. Shuuko gasped again, and began to tear up at the sight.

It seemed as if the entire world could hear her scream out the fallen jinchuuriki's name.

* * *

**Questions from Truth Be Told: How does the bijuu break from it's cage? I thought it was sealed shut?**

**Answer: In the Chunin Exams (part one of Naruto), when Gaara was fighting Naruto, Gaara fell asleep releasing the Shukaku. Also, in Shippuuden, the Kyuubi tries to persuade Naruto to break the seal and let him free. That's a hint that the jinchuuriki are one of the key elements that keep their bijuu sealed. However, if you aren't strong enough, (Kakashi was explaining to Naruto that he needed to keep control over the Kyuubi) then the bijuu will try to take advantage of the situation. See how whenever Naruto's angry when it comes to talking about Sasuke he accidently lets the Kyuubi's chakra leak out? He never really asks for the Kyuubi to come out but it does. He doesn't have enough control to keep its power from leaking out. **


	32. Yugito's Stand

_Chapter Thirty-Two: Yugito's Stand_

**"Quit your crying, pitiful human." **Shuuko jerked her head up towards the Sanbi. "What...?, her voice sounding breathless. **"All of you are going to end up the same way. Well... except for you." **The demon's voice was dark and hoarse. An empty-voice really. Expressionless and uncaring. Not the least bit of hope or comfort in its tone.

The kunoichi's mouth dropped open as she stared up at the demon. **"You might as well save your tears; all of your friends are going to die."**

The girl stopped, she sat there crouching over.

_Dead frozen._

What did he mean all of her friends were going to die? All except for her? All of the possibilities of what he could mean ran through her mind. However, there was no other way to explain that. Shuuko's eyes slowly drifted up to the demons. When her eyes locked to the turtle demon's, she felt an unbearable shiver run down her spine.

His eyes: bloodshot and vicious. They met hers with despise and hate. She had seen those same eyes before. Somewhere... Yes! They were the same eyes the people in her village had when they looked at her. She turned away from the gaze, finally being able to stand on her feet.

**"One by one, you'll all be taken by the Akatsuki." **The Sanbi growled once more. A grin pulled on the Jashin adherent's lips just then. With that, the Sanbi slowly crept off, making the foundation tremble with each of his steps.

Hidan turned back to the group of jinchuuriki. After surveyed them carefully, he noticed a couple of things: One of them was knocked unconscious, one was dead, there was a jinchuuriki missing, and in the pile, both his and Kakuzu's jinchuuriki were there.

The silver-haired man cracked his neck and stretched a bit. He snagged his scythe that had been plunged into the ground by its blades. After twirling it around expertly, he stood in a battle-ready position.

"Ready, Kakuzu?"

At that moment, the jinchuuriki noticed that the stitched nin had been behind them that entire time. How?! He was so quiet; almost mute!

Simultaneously, Yugito removed a kunai from her back pouch. When Kakuzu unleashed tendrils between the stitches in his arms, the blonde jonin lunged to block the attack. Her attempt proved successful. As the assault was halted, Roushi took the opportunity to scoop up Rikuto and lead the other jinchuuriki out of the area.

It didn't take long until they heard Yugito's steps close behind. "Do we have a plan?" Gouta asked, still running. Yugito dodged an upcoming tendril. "Run like hell?" she sarcastically suggested. However, her sarcasm was looked down upon by Roushi.

"This is no time to be cracking jokes," the older man chided. He lead the group around another corner, but was soon abruptly stopped when a large boulder smashed in front of them.

The ceiling was slowly crumbling from the Sanbi's movement. Without working a sweat, Killer Bee lifted up the boulder with one arm! He flashed everyone a proud smirk, but Roushi only returned it with a weak smile.

The group pressed on, but as they turned another corner, the wall broke down. Hidan stood there and he swung his scythe immediately at Roushi's head. If he had moved only a second slower, Roushi would have been decapitated.

"We seriously need a strategy!" Roushi called out, his voice lined with panic. Abruptly, the blonde kunoichi stopped. "You guys keep going, I'll handle things here." The woman replied half-turning to the group.

"But Yugito-" Shuuko started. However, she was interrupted, "Hurry and go!" Yugito yelled. With one last look, all of the others were gone.

* * *

**On my profile, I have added information about all of the jinchuuriki. The ones for Rikuto, Gouta, Shuuko, and Ritsuki is made up, but the other info is the actual character's information. **


	33. The Nibi Emerges

Disclaimer: In this chapter, there are some quotes from the actual Naruto Shippuuden episode. I don't own Naruto.

_Chapter Thirty-Three: The Nibi Emerges _

The blonde kunoichi waited for Hidan and Kakuzu to come by. She was trapped in that one room of space. The woman tried to hide her smile as the two Akatsuki members walked straight into her trap.

After exchanging a few words and a 'battle cry' (from Yugito's side), Yugito formed the needed hand sign. From behind the two Akatsuki members that stood in the doorway, an explosive tag attached to the ceiling triggered a mini rockslide. All of the the exits _and_ entrances were blocked completely.

Yugito couldn't help but smile. This was incredible! Had they actually fallen for such a cheap trick?! When she saw Hidan's mouth agape, she knew that it was right and that they had fallen for her ploy.

"Since I know you two are from the Akatsuki, I can't let you go free." Yugito exclaimed, her face smug and bitter.

Her mask of confidence didn't waver, but in the truth of all truths, she hoped she had enough chakra and strength to battle them.

And win.

"I swear by the name, Nii Yugito of Kumogakure, that I will kill you!"

After a while more of chattering between the three, Yugito was finally ready to fight. Right away, she changed into a smaller version of her bijuu. The water between the three surged into a mini whirlpool. And Yugito's blonde hair ripped out of her band from all of the tension and chakra surrounding her.

"Don't mess with me!" Yugito cried out, her body transformed into the blue two-tailed cat, yellow eyes flashed at the two furiously.

"Whoa, whoa for real?" Hidan asked in awe looking up at the demon. She roared in response. Heaving, Nibi-Yugito exhaled an enormous, orange ball of furious fire. Hidan was quick to dodge it. And with just that, a portion of the small building they were inside blew up.

~-~

Safely outside, Roushi turned to look at the damage. "I hope Yugito's alright back there," Gouta replied also sneaking a peak. "She'll be fine," Roushi responded. However, he had second thoughts about it.

"I wish we hadn't left her alone," Shuuko said staring at the broken down building her group had abandoned. "She'll be fine, don't look down on her strength." Killer Bee told the Shichibi jinchuuriki. He wished he had something to back that up with though. And Shuuko didn't believe a word of it anyway.

~-~

Hidan looked out from behind a boulder, his palm sedately hovering over the scythe. Then, his palm enclosed around it, pulled away, and then snagged his weapon once more. He turned to see where his prey was and if it was semi safe to come out of hiding.

It wasn't.

The blue demon was waiting for him patiently. If looks could kill, Hidan would have been long gone. If he wasn't immortal of course. But he was; too bad Yugito had no idea.

"I thought cats didn't like hot stuff," the white-haired man joked to himself. But then, this was no ordinary cat either. "So this is the Two-Tailed demon cat they call the 'Living Ghost'. However, Hidan's analysis didn't change the problem at hand, he was still -as he called it- a rat in a cage.

Getting tired of waiting for him, with a swing of her chakra paw, Nibi-Yugito sent the rock Hidan hid behind flat on top of him. And with her distracted, Kakuzu had already unleashed his masks once more.

Nibi-Yugito had made her way over to Hidan and was about to (somehow) kill him for good. Again, she heaved one incredible fireball and sent it at the Jashinist. As the fireball came just _inches _away from Hidan, it was met with a ball of water that was just as big.

Nibi-Yugito turned to face Kakuzu's Suiton mask. But instead of attacking the mask, she attacked Kakuzu.

* * *

**Questions...**

**Elemental Dragon Swordman: Is Yugito's bijuu going to be the next one to come out?**

**Answer: You'll get your answer soon enough. ^-^**


	34. Visions that Reappear

_Chapter Thirty-Four: Visions that Reappear_

Nibi-Yugito sent a steaming ball of fire at Kakuzu, but in a blink of an eye, he had hardened his body and the fire didn't even affect him! The Akatsuki member watched the grey smoke disappear from his face. When he could see again, Nibi-Yugito was swatting at him as if he were a fly. Finally, she had him cornered close to a large boulder.

Her chakra-filled paw fell atop of Kakuzu, crushing him. What she didn't know was that from behind her, Hidan attacked. He circled the demon then wrapped her feet in the long rope attached to his scythe.

He didn't wait a minute ―or rather he couldn't wait, he sent the blades of the scythe out to the face of the demon. It struck her hard in the pupil-less socket of her eye. Then, he wrenched the weapon downward actually _cutting apart_ her chakra.

The three blades abruptly stopped at her chest, and Nibi-Yugito's entire appearance changed to her normal kunoichi face. She fell to the ground on 'all fours', her blonde hair falling over her face messily. Her right hand immediately fell atop her wounded and bleeding eye.

Yugito winced from the pain and as she was about to mutter a curse, something fell on her ―a shadow. Looking up, she saw Hidan with a large smirk on his malicious face. "Too bad that you didn't take up Jashinism; then you might not be in this situation." Hidan smirked at her. However, Yugito made no attempt to say anything back to him. She just coughed out blood and her hand immediately fell in front of her mouth to stop the blood.

Hidan continued seeing she wasn't going to say anything. He bent down, pike in hand, and swiped the blade of the pike with some of the blood that had come from Yugito's mouth. His tongue licked up the sweet substance, and Yugito saw his entire body turn black and white.

_"Those who do not join our religion... will die by the hands of those who have." _

Yugito watched in absolute horror as Hidan lifted his weapon and stabbed himself straight through the stomach with the shining blade.

Slowly, Hidan placed a hand on his stomach and let the blood drift onto the ground. With his feet, he made a circle bearing a triangle inside. Once he was inside the symbol, his hand drifted to the blade once more, pushing it deeper and deeper inside.

In pain, Yugito hurled over as Hidan relished the feeling. To make it even worse, Hidan pulled the blade _straight_ out. Yugito's face fell onto the ground as her hands quickly began stroking her stomach trying to ease the pain.

It didn't work.

"Stupid... bitch... you s-should have... converted to Jashin...ism...." Hidan was barely able to mutter under his breath. Yugito didn't hear a thing. Instead, she was busy reliving the nightmare she had gone through in Tsukuyomi.

Finally, she had enough guts to look back up at Hidan's spiteful face. He was smiling at her despite the blood dripping from both sides of his mouth. "So, should I go slow...? Or should I end this now?" The white-haired man twirled around the blade expertly as he waited as if Yugito could answer. Surprisingly, she did. "I'll... still kill you," Yugito stammered, "if it's the last thing I... do!" The thunder ringing through her voice.

Every last 'drop' of the Nibi's chakra was encompassed around her. Her nails grew as long as cat claws and her teeth grew long and vicious. She swung her chakra induced tails at Hidan who was forced to leave his circle to avoid the attack.

"This is the end of you!" Nibi-Yugito cried, determined. With all her chakra, she made a fireball that could take down an entire village with one graze. The ball exploded and rushed after Hidan with nothing stopping it. To make sure it hit him, Nibi-Yugito's tails flung adding wind to it.

The fire grew so large that it burned everything it passed by. Even by coming a few feet away from Hidan, it burned his leg as he tried to avoid it. The fireball took up the entire sewer and there was nothing stopping it from hitting Hidan straight on.

Excitement burned in the pit of Yugito's voice and it soon spilled over into her voice. "_Die pathetic bastard_!"

True, the fireball did demolish the entire sewer and the building above, and it ripped through twenty villages beyond. But, the thing it didn't hit was the most important.

From behind Yugito, Kakuzu had gotten his Raiton mask to make an incredible lighting ball that blew a hole straight through Yugito. The fireball had only missed Hidan by twenty inches exactly.

* * *

**Over the last few chapters, I noticed more people have been favoriting (?) this fanfic. I'd like to thank everyone for reading and favoriting. Reviewing also makes me **_**incredibly**_** happy as well. **


	35. Temporarily in Hiding Part I

_Chapter Thirty-Five: Temporarily in Hiding _

_~Part I~_

Hidan wasn't exactly a master of masking his feelings, so he stared at Yugito in complete panic and horror as she changed back to her normal look and fell to the ground, face-forward.

"The-the hell?!" Hidan responded, panting heavily. Yugito looked up slowly at the two Akatsuki members before her. She opened her mouth to say something, but out of fear, Hidan had gotten up and stabbed her through the chest. He had the idea in mind that she was going to attack once more, but what he was really afraid of was the thought that she had something worse than that fireball.

Yugito's eyes closed and her body went limp. Kakuzu walked over to the fallen jinchuuriki. She was dead, he was sure of it. He glanced at his partner who had already replaced his scared face with a grin.

With a roll of his eyes, Kakuzu picked up the female's corpse. "Let's hurry up go after the other jinchuuriki. They can't be too far from here." Hidan had enough guts to crack a joke.

"So we're finally not going after a bounty?" Kakuzu glanced at his team member but didn't answer. Hidan slipped off the boulder that had been turned over flat. "Sure, but how the hell are we supposed to get out of-," his voice trailed off as he noticed that they were outside and that the sun was already in the process of setting.

Kakuzu began to start walking when Hidan called out for him to wait. Kakuzu turned around to see his partner thrust a large stick inside his chest. Then, the lay down on the ground inside a Jashin circle.

Kakuzu sighed and tied Yugito's hands with rope as he pinned her to a wall.

* * *

"What the hell happened back there?" Gouta asked. The smoke had traveled far enough so even they could see it.

The others stopped and turned to see what happened. A pain hit Roushi hard in the stomach and in his head, something deeply told him, Yugito was dead. The maroon-haired man shook his head trying to kill the idea. "Let's go." The older man declared loudly.

"But... what about Yugito?" Shuuko replied turning around. She had an innocent, almost pleading look in her eyes. Nobody answered her--or better yet put, nobody could.

And from the silence, the green-haired girl finally understood. Her blonde jonin friend was dead. Amazing! Two jinchuuriki were already dead in just one day. Shuuko swore she had suffered a tiny heart attack when she had finally understood.

"Well, if the fight's over," Shuuko replied sullenly, "then that must mean they're going to be coming after us now." The other shinobi slowly looked up at her. She was absolutely correct.

"How far away is Konohagakure from here?" Gouta asked the all-knowing Roushi. The red-haired man pondered the question for a while. "Maybe a few days --maybe even _weeks_," was the man's answer. "We need to bury Rikuto and-""But what about Yugito?"

Shuuko interrupted. Her face wasn't adjusted in its familiar happy-go-lucky and exuberant demeanor, instead, it was altered to an unusual dark mask that bore eyes of hatred and dour.

"If we go back... we'll _all_ die." Roushi told the girl. "I'm all out of chakra and I'm sure everyone else is as well. If we use bijuu chakra, that could destroy this entire place if things got out of hand. Besides, Ritsuki is still unconscious."

Shuuko took a brief moment to remember the blonde jonin. She couldn't help but curse Yugito now knowing that the blonde had left her as the only female to the group. Then she turned to look back at the self-proclaimed leader of their little group.

"I-I guess so. Let's go." With millions of questions on their minds, they prowled on ahead.

* * *

Night was rapidly catching up with the four jinchuuriki (only counting the ones alive, awake, and present). At that moment, they were leaping through the billions of trees in a dark forest. At about that time, Hidan had ended his ritual long before, and he and his partner handed the corpse over to Zetsu --another Akatsuki member.

With that, the two Akatsuki members flew through the forest in search of the other jinchuuriki they could capture. Kakuzu, however, could have done without Hidan's whining and complaining. Finally, the masked shinobi's prayers were answered and he could sense the presence of the four jinchuuriki.

They had stopped; but for what reason?

"Here." Roushi knelt down in the dirt with his palm open. Inside, were five small dark brown pills. Solider pills. Each of the jinchuuriki popped the much-needed energy booster into their mouths. Roushi followed their example, but stopped suddenly in mid-chew. "Someone's coming."

Silence spread over all of the shinobi as one out of four of them took out a kunai. Everyone remained drowned in dead silence until a semi-familiar voice was heard from behind.

"Where's Yugito?" Shuuko spun around, instantly dropping her kunai. Her face broke into an ecstatic smile as she hugged her friend. "Ritsuki! Finally!" The celadon-haired girl embraced her fatigued friend tightly. Ritsuki flashed her a weary glare, but was too tired to push her off. Exhaustedly, Ritsuki repeated his question.

Shuuko froze for a quick second as she let go of her friend. Looking sullenly at the ground, she answered his question albeit in a barely audible voice.

"She... died." Ritsuki jerked his head over to her in pure shock **―** one of the only actual expressions Shuuko had actually seen from him. The black-haired boy's normal impassive expression came back to his face, and cold eyes looked over at Rikuto. He looked up and down at the pale-skinned and cold-bodied boy thoroughly.

"What happened to Rikuto?" Ritsuki asked in a monotone, although, he somewhat already knew the answer.

Shuuko bit her lip**― **it was the only thing she could to prevent the tears that were trying to break free. "He died too." She finally managed to say without her voice breaking too much. This time, she didn't receive a surprised look from Ritsuki. In fact, it looked somewhat as he looked at Rikuto with disdain and disgust. Then he simply snorted and looked away muttering something that sounded like "serves him right."

Shuuko almost felt as if she would punch Ritsuki just for that, but refrained from doing it. He had just gotten up and was probably still sore anyway.

At that minute, Roushi shoved Shuuko out of the way and she fell atop Ritsuki with a _thud_. "They're here," Roushi simply responded, "split up." Shuuko saw a quick glimpse of Kakuzu holding a kunai not so far away from them.

"Split up?! Isn't that what got Yugito killed?!" Shuuko exclaimed. "That was when we went alone. Gouta go with Killer Bee, Shuuko with Ritsuki, I'll go on my own." Everyone

acquiesced in Roushi's decision and quickly headed off deeper into the darkness of the forest.


	36. Temporarily in Hiding Part II

_Chapter Thirty-Six: Temporarily in Hiding_

_~Part II~_

The sun had long before set, and the moon had made it's mystical appearance over everyone and everything. The light the moon shed was indeed helpful, but it helped both parties, captor and prey. Hidan and Kakuzu hurriedly made their way through stealthily through the forest. They both could sense the strong chakra of everyone from the group. They were no longer running low.

"Damn it!" Hidan swore loudly, not caring who heard him (most of which were just nocturnal animals that took residence in trees). "They used soldier pills or something." For once, Kakuzu didn't bother telling his partner to shut it. In fact, he was actually grateful for the information. "There's one person who's chakra is still low." Kakuzu corrected in a monotone. Hidan gave him a quizzical look in response. "They'll be the weakest, and the easiest to attack."

Hidan finally understood and nodded knowingly. Adventure and malevolent sparkled in his cerise-colored eyes. The Jashinist was not above relishing a good battle. A good, _bloody_ battle to be exact. He stepped forward grabbing his three-bladded weapon that was attached to his back. "How far away are they exactly?" Kakuzu thought it over for a while but failed to answer. He shook the question off, and the two flung ahead through the dark trees.

"Keep your guard up, Hidan. Don't be reckless. Remember what happened with the Nibi?" Kakuzu lectured Hidan, his voice lined with boredom. He couldn't help but feel like a parent. Hidan sneered for a second sneaking a peek at the masked-nin's face. "I thought you said we'd never talk about that again?" Kakuzu didn't answer or didn't even attempt to. So with that, the two traveled on in silence.

* * *

"Ouch, damn, shit..." Ritsuki muttered profanity after profanity as he crawled on his stomach through the _spiky_ bushes. _'Gimme a break,'_ he thought to himself wearily. Only hours before, he had almost lost complete control (okay, he had lost _all_ control) of the Rokubi, he had collapsed, and had been out cold for more than three hours, now, he was _still_ a little tired -not to mention sore- and was being forced to crawl through the bushes with his least favorite person in the world.

"Ritsuki, if it hurts so much, why don't you just crawl on your hands and knees like me? Not on your stomach." Shuuko pleasantly chirped behind the black-haired jinchuuriki. Ritsuki chose to ignore her. But suddenly took a double-take. Making an impromptu jerk of his head, he whirled around to see Shuuko straight in his face. Without a second thought, he slammed her head, face-first, into the ground. "You're supposed to lay low, idiot!" A red-face Ritsuki sputtered.

"Sorry..." Shuuko grumbled through the dirt. Only, it sounded more like "swaree". The two crouched low again and continued crawling through the bushes. It wasn't long before Shuuko began whining. And to make matter worse, crawling through spiky bushes with an open shirt wasn't the best decision.

* * *

Elsewhere, Gouta and Killer Bee where having better luck tolerating each other. Why-- because they weren't talking to each other. Jumping through what seemed like millions of trees, Gouta was in the lead.

"I don't feel their chakra as close." Gouta reported the obvious. Killer Bee only nodded. Gouta stopped abruptly on one of the tree limbs and looked around vigilantly. "Something wrong?" Killer Bee asked tweaking an eyebrow. "They turned the other way; they're going east." Gouta reported.

Killer Bee gave him a quizzical look that clearly said 'And who is in the east?' Gouta caught the look and frowned a bit. "That means Ritsuki and Shuuko are in trouble. They're obviously the weakest ones here." Gouta said, noting the fact that Ritsuki was most-likely still wounded, and was the only one who _hadn't_ received a soldier pill. "There's no way Shuuko can protect him herself." Killer Bee thought it over. Even if Shuuko had a bijuu that was one tail stronger than Ritsuki, that didn't mean she was going to use chakra from the Shichibi.

Killer Bee nodded making more sense of the fact and followed Gouta as he turned around rapidly to get to Ritsuki and Shuuko.

* * *

Ritsuki didn't seem to be the only one in the forest cussing up a storm. Trouble was tree-jumping as well, in the form of short and silver-haired masochist.

"This is ridiculous! Leader is such a bitch --sending me on mission after mission and letting the other members go on back to the hideout. Why the hell did the bastard even put me with Kakuzu?! He knows we're not compatible!"

The lavender-eyed shinobi continued searching for two weak chakra signatures. So far, he wasn't having any such luck. A while before (it had seemed like ages to the albino), he and his money-loving partner had separating.

Obviously, Kakuzu was underestimating him by giving him the two weakest jinchuuriki. And yet, Hidan hadn't argued-- all that much. Did Kakuzu seriously sell Hidan that short? The Jashinist mused over the thought a while longer until he was taken by surprise.

Tension... light and weak. Not tension-- chakra. He had stumbled on the two jinchuuriki he had been looking for. Lack of his partner's recognition forgotten, a grin pulled on the man's lips. Absently, a hand fell inside his pike. Surprisingly, he was already planning on a surprise attack. First using his pike, then he's make a swift switch to his scythe.

He landed as silently as he could, he stealthy crept around waiting for the right moment to attack.

* * *

Shuuko and Ritsuki were still crawling through the brush silently. Both of them were still unaware that they had been spotted (What do you expect? Ritsuki was only half-awake, and Shuuko was just a genin more or less.).

Out of sheer luck alone, a small jab of unfamiliar chakra poked at Ritsuki's senses. Looking around cautiously, he tried to sense where it was coming from exactly. For added effect, the jinchuuriki stopped dead.

"I don't think we're alone anymore." Ritsuki murmured, searching around the bushes. At this, Shuuko brightened a little. However, in Shuuko's mind, the comment was misconstrued. _'So Ritsuki wanted to be alone with me all this time....' _Shuuko figured dumbly. That's when and how a large smirk spread across her lips as she scooted closer to Ritsuki. He was unaware. Leaning closer to get his attention, Shuuko let blush cover her cheeks.

The scarlet-eyed girl puckered her lips, and leaned over and kissed her partner on the cheek-- or rather, she would have if a hand hadn't clasped against her mouth. Her eyes cracked open to see Ritsuki was absorbed in figuring out who the strange chakra belonged to. It felt like eternity until Ritsuki finally dropped his hand from her mouth and sighed. "We're safe."

The black-head crept a little further with a disappointed girl close behind. Ritsuki popped a head out of the bushes. In front of him were two pairs of sandals. Those were attached to legs, and that was attached to the silver-haired Akatsuki member. "Shit." Ritsuki inwardly cursed.

Hidan just smirked devilishly. "You had half of your body in your grave as soon as you stepped out of the bushes, bastard."


	37. Divided We Fail

_Chapter Thirty-Seven: Divided We Fail_

The large red scythe came down with an enormous _smash_. Despite how Hidan claimed he was a slow attacker, he sure seemed pretty fast to the Rokubi-jinchuuriki. He had just barely gotten Shuuko out of harms way, in fact, he had just barely gotten _himself_ out of the way. Panting, black eyes scanned over Hidan's weapon of choice. The silver-haired man was leaning casually against the hilt. He was acting as if swinging that _thing_ was easy!

Landing like a cat on his feet, Ritsuki threw Shuuko on the ground beside him. And the green-haired girl couldn't help but feel like a simple sack of rice-- or better yet, a rag doll. "Focus." Ritsuki lectured her, his tone deadpan. "H-He took me by surprise... that's all." Shuuko stammered defensively. In all honesty, she didn't even _sense_ Hidan's chakra, and that was bad, even for a genin. Ignoring her excuse, Ritsuki whipped out a kunai and attacked the Jashinist head-on.

Again, Hidan lifted his scythe up using no effort whatsoever. He laid the weapon on his shoulder, for he held it like a baseball bat getting ready to swing. Once Ritsuki got within three mere _inches_ of the man, he swung hard, completely knocking the surprised shinobi off his feet. Midway to the ground (which was not that far underneath him, I might add), Ritsuki made a strange U-turn, landing roughly in the dirt. That caused Hidan to roll uncontrollably with laughter, taking both Shuuko _and_ Ritsuki by surprise.

Hidan even had the audacity to begin to _point_ and laugh. Extending his index finger, he jabbed at Ritsuki, practically choking on his own breath. "W-What's so funny?!" The celadon-haired girl hadn't intended on stammering, but she couldn't help but feel... weak and pathetic against the man that had killed Yugito. "Y-You can.... barely... _stand_!" Hidan gasped between immense breaths of laughter. "And what is so funny about that?!" Shuuko retorted. In a second, she wished she had kept her mouth shut. Rose-colored eyes fell on her, and Hidan tweaked an eyebrow. "You seem to have more chakra than your friend here, why don't you fight me instead?"

Shuuko hesitated at first, then jumped at the idea. Her hands hovered over the red pack on her back, and she whipped it off and slammed it against the ground. With a strange squeal, Hidan charged straight for the girl, the blades of the scythe gave one quick shine, and the two made impact.

* * *

The red-haired jonin was anything but happy about leaping from tree to tree through the dark forest. Not only was it hard to see, but despite the impromptu burst of chakra, courtesy of his soldier pill, he was tired. The sad thing was, he wasn't exactly sure it was due to the fact that he had been running on empty for more than twenty-four hours, or it was just because he was old. He was _older_ than fifty.

Mental sighing and leaving that fact behind, Roushi took an abrupt U-turn, using one of trees using it as a trampoline. Chakra seared off of it as he continued leaping from tree to tree.

He had only gotten to notice the chakra for about two seconds before a giant dropped in front of him, shaking the tree violently. In the blink of an eye, Roushi had withdrawn a kunai, rearing backwards and preparing for Kakuzu's assault. When Kakuzu didn't move, Roushi took the first move. He lunged at the masked-nin, kunai in a stabbing notion. Kakuzu shot his detachable arm straight for the marron-haired man's neck, the tendrils oscillating as if they were alive.

When the limb attached to the shinobi's neck, it immediately popped into smoke--nothing short of what the Akatsuki-nin had expected. From above, heat began accumulating atop the scruff of the taller ninja's neck. Looking up, Kakuzu saw his opponent looming, hand seals being created rapidly.

From the man's mouth, there came a large red fireball (it was more like a lavaball). Surprisingly Kakuzu stood completely still. At the last minute his Suiton mask jumped into the scene. Heaving, the weapon blasted the element ball into harmless smoke. Roushi, --who was still in the air--, landing in a strange side-ways kick to Kakuzu's side. Kakuzu dodged using both arms as if they were a shield. From the impact of the kick, the two rev back a bit, and almost completely fall from the tree.

* * *

A masked-nin and his tanned team member jumped through the trees, and finally, Hidan and Kakuzu's chakra finally registered in their brains. Gouta took his time to stop and tell Killer Bee this as well: "Kakuzu and Hidan have already begun attacking."

Killer Bee sighed and slapped his forehead. "Roushi's an idiot." Gouta gave him a look to explain his position. "Roushi split us up, _again_. If we all stayed together, we would have a greater advantage against Akatsuki." Gouta nodded a bit, still a little lost.

"Dumbing it down even further," Killer Bee responded, grousing, "Divided, we fail, but together, we would have the advantage of five against two." Gouta blinked regarding that for a while. "I guess so." The masked shinobi nodded and the two continued.

* * *

**Questions: **

**Elemental Dragon Swordman: Why does it feel as if the Jinchuuriki are gonna get captured in the future chapters?**

**Answer: Ha ha ha, you read me like a book! Not **_**completely**_** though. Rikuto didn't exactly get captured. . . But that's pretty much what's going to happen. (But not completely) **

**Elemental Dragon Swordman: Does Shuuko like Ritsuki or something like that?**

**Answer: Again, correct. Too bad Ritsuki doesn't feel the same way. :P And sadly, they never get together. Oh well...**


	38. Evaluating Predictions

_Chapter Thirty-Eight: Evaluating Predictions _

The hit the ground with a crack, that even made Ritsuki's stomach drop instantly. He would _never_ admit it, not even if he was being tortured to tell, but he actually felt completely _sorry_ for her and the fact that she had to take such a hit. Don't get him wrong, he was also doing all he could to attack Hidan as well, but this was an Akatsuki member, damn it! Akatsuki weren't people you wanted to mess with.

The green-haired kunoichi barely had enough time to lunge out of the way before Hidan came at her again, screaming and laughing maniacally. She was panting hard and looked as if she was on her last leg.

"This is freakin' retarded!" Hidan scoffed, still laughing, however. "You can't expect to beat me looking as drained as that. Sorry, but you're royally fucked, atheist-bitch." Shuuko took that time to hang her head and try to catch her breath. Hidan took that as a chance to attack once more, this time swinging his scythe horizontally in an attempt to behead her.

But the girl ducked just in time to only lose three wisps of hair. Shuuko was thankful, nonetheless. Loosing hair was just a slap on the wrist, anyway.

As Hidan stumbled to recapture his footing, Ritsuki took the chance to try a kick form behind; one that looked very much like Maito Gai's _Konoha Senpuu_.

Luck seemed to be in the black-haired jinchuuriki's favor, for Hidan's smile had been wiped clean off his face. In fact, Hidan looked as if the wind had been knocked right out of him. Probably a shock that blood was falling from his head and slowly dribbling to his right eye. At that moment, the Jashinist was enraged.

"Why you little _fucker_!" Ritsuki didn't even mind the name, he did, however, wince a bit nonetheless. He was just happy that as Hidan was ranting, he had a short time to rest. His break didn't last long, 'cause apparently, Hidan wasn't one to give up from just an injury.

The silver-haired man stood up quickly, scythe ready to slice Ritsuki's head clean off. He let out a raucous cackle as he charged straight towards the jinchuuriki. The inches between them decreasing rapidly.

Unfortunately, the assault was a ruse.

Disappearing instantly, Hidan ended up behind Shuuko, who had long before fallen to her knees. He looked down at the wide-eyed girl who was shivering accordingly. Hidan lifted instead of his usual scythe, his pike (much to Ritsuki's horror). And with a grin that could only be described as malicious, he shoved the shining weapon straight through the kunoichi's stomach, watching the blood flow.

* * *

Killer Bee and Gouta hadn't payed much more attention to the situation where they both thought of the old saying, 'A House Divided Against Itself Cannot Stand'. Instead, they were both lost in their own complex shinobi thoughts.

"We're getting closer to Ritsuki and Shuuko." Killer Bee noted nodding towards the trees in front of them. Gouta stifled a sigh of relief as he hoped against hope that they were alright, and had been able to handle Hidan properly.

Surprisingly, Gouta was just as unsure and worried as he looked. That resulted to Killer Bee perusing him thoroughly, almost daring him to speak. Gouta nodded, noticing this, "You're right, Kirabi-san."

Said wannabe poet frowned at the name. "I demand respect, respect! You may, however, call me Jinchuuriki-_sama_." The strange poet accentuated the last line perfectly. Gouta successfully carried out a furtive eye roll. What was with 'Jinchuuriki-sama' now?

All of a sudden, he heard a sudden and gruff 'ahem' that came from neither him or Killer Bee. "Oh! And you may call my bijuu, 'Hachibi-_sama_'." Gouta was shocked at this. "You actually get _along_ with your bijuu? The masked-nin couldn't help but press.

Killer Bee, however, looked rather insulted. "Very much so." Gouta was quick to change the subject, dismissing it as something the jounin had learned over their training year. "What do you think... the—the Sanbi meant when he said we were all going to die? Save for Shuuko, though."

The other man tapped his chin, a famous thinking position. "I think it's rather strange. And the Sanbi was never wrong was he?" It was a rhetorical question, but Gouta answered with a simple nod anyway.

"The thing is... Shuuko's not that strong." Gouta nodded, albeit a bit distraughtly. As if on cue, Shuuko's bloodcurdling screams hit the skies, hitting the two jounin like a sack of bricks.

* * *

**Question from Elemental Dragon Swordman: When are gonna see Naruto?**

**Answer: Next chapter; I promise. **


	39. Sparkling Eyes Filled with Loathing

_Chapter Thirty-Nine: Sparking Eyes Filled with Loathing_

Blood puddle after blood puddle hit and stained the ground before them. Hidan was just having a field day as he stabbed himself mercilessly inside of his jutsu's circle. Shuuko, on the other hand, wasn't having as much fun. She was littered with various red scratches and gashes on her tanned skin.

Shockingly, luck was still on her side, even if it was barely noticeable. Hidan had managed not to hit any vital organs, and her wounds weren't too serious. She had doubled over and was just wishing for Hidan to simply die already so she could stop suffering. However, that was where luck had ignored her. The masochist was evidentially enjoying every minute of every stab. He was also screaming out things like, "The pain feels so fucking good," and "Aren't you enjoying this?"

"No way in hell am I enjoying this, idiot!" Shuuko wanted to scream. But her mouth was being used as the opening for blood to come through. All this while, the vague thought of 'where in the hell was Ritsuki' burned deeply inside of her.

Said black-head was behind Hidan, holding a kunai in hand. From behind, he stabbed the silver-haired man in the back. That, of course, resulted to hurting Shuuko in the same exact spot. And Ritsuki was shocked --not to mention a little scared-- at her sudden outburst. "Whatever happens to him happens to me, you idiot!"

Luckily, he understood her position and didn't hold it against her. (Any other time he would have left her to die, or if this situation wasn't playing out like it was, he would have simply thought it was that lovely time of month for her.) The black-eyed jinchuuriki backpedaled, thinking about what he could do to rescue her. Unfortunately, he didn't have time to just sit back and think. Hidan would get tired of their game and would start torturing her for real.

He would never have admitted it out loud, but he wished Rikuto was there to tell him about what he had to deal with when he was fighting the insane masochist.

* * *

The two jounin stopped dead as they heard Shuuko's scream echo through their ears. Both clearly clothed in a blanket of shock, and a sickening sensation in the pit of their stomachs. "Do you think she's dead?" The tanned Jinchuuriki asked Gouta who shrugged as an uncertain response. Gouta caught Killer Bee's questionable look downwards. Was he waiting for the Hachibi's answer?

"What does your bijuu say?" Gouta asked half-heartedly. Honestly, he seriously didn't like the Hachibi, much more than that, he didn't like calling him 'Hachibi-_sama_'. But whether he liked it or not, the Hachibi- Jinchuuriki shot him a rather vicious glare. "My bijuu?" Gouta stifled an eye roll once more. "Excuse me. Hachibi-_sama_, then." Killer Bee relaxed, just barely. "The honorable Hachibi-sama said that we should be with Shuuko and Ritsuki in no time. But from that scream, it sounded like she was in pain."

Gouta couldn't help but pale a bit. And that was all it took for him to pump chakra into his feet and push himself off of a tree branch, maximizing the momentum.

* * *

Roushi and Kakuzu were in a stalemate. Taijutsu-wise, anyway. When Shuuko's scream came over the wind of the dark night, Roushi froze instantly. That left him open for any attack, and Kakuzu would be damned if he didn't take the advantage. He flung his arm off, as if it were a torpedo, and the weapon wrapped around Roushi's neck. The body immediately transformed into smoke.

Kakuzu didn't miss a beat. He jerked his head upwards to see Roushi trying his same old lavaball attack once more. The stitched-nin inwardly sighed. This game was so... _insipid_. His attention was rapidly fading, and he was just waiting for Roushi to go full Yonbi. The Suiton mask, again blocked the attack easily. And Roushi pulled back.

_I honestly need a new strategy; I'm only limited to two simple elements, while this guy has all five. _The maroon-haired jounin chided himself. Looking up, Kakuzu did seem rather bored. He looked almost _tired_. The Akatsuki-nin even had the audacity to _yawn_.

The coal-eyed shinobi mentally slapped himself. _Gouta would have been a better match up for him. _He sighed and shook his head. Luckily, he cracked his eyes open just in time to avoid Kakuzu's body slam. With that final crack, the tree broke. That left Roushi falling fast and wondering if Kakuzu would attack him from the air.

Evidentially shinobi lives were _not_ that easy. And it seemed almost idiotic to believe Kakuzu _wouldn't_ drop from the tree with yet another attack. Roushi's fall was cut short when Kakuzu's feet pushed him further downwards faster. The Yonbi-Jinchuuriki hit the ground on his back, and from Kakuzu's weight, the ground seemed to cave in a bit. Kakuzu proceeded to prod the man's head several times, and when he got tired (rather quickly, I might add), he proceeded to kicking Roushi around like a ping-pong ball.

* * *

Shuuko was a bloody mess by the time Hidan had taken a break to stop stabbing himself. Blood dribbled from both ends of her mouth, and she spat out a mouthful at his feet. The silver-haired man ignored her and smirked.

She proceeded to look around for her companion, but he was no where to be seen. And that was when she felt a small jab in her chest. Had Ritsuki just abandoned her? If so, why? The girl looked around, more frantically now. Fear had taken over her face and despite the blood, she was also sweating buckets. "Looking around for that other bastard?" Hidan replied, idly examining the slick drop of blood along his pike.

Surprisingly Shuuko nodded as if Hidan would tell her where he went. "He probably abandoned you by now." Said Jashinist scoffed. The green-haired girl felt her face fall. A disturbing frown plastered across her face, but she vowed that she wouldn't cry. Instead, she decided to ask a question that had been chewing at the end of her sub-consciousness being for quite a while. "Wh-Why didn't you just stab me in the heart already?" She hoped against hope that Hidan wouldn't get any ideas if he hadn't already.

Hidan answered the question with a wide smirk. "Attacking the vitals is such a waste. I like to enjoy and savor the pain. I love to taste the blood that drips from both of us being connected. And," he paused for a second, "I love to see those faces of fear, agony, and, or, sorrow as I stab every last piece of flesh you have." His voice rose immensely, almost into a shriek. "Does that answer your question, huh?"

Truth be told, Shuuko wanted to puke. The kunoichi was beyond afraid, but she had no time to answer. Hidan had lifted his pike and was inches away from stabbing his heart when he paused abruptly. Bubbling and gurgling filled both of fighter's ears, and when Shuuko looked up, she saw Hidan's legs were stuck in water that seemed to be _climbing_ higher up his body, engulfing him at a rapid pace.

The kunoichi broke into a wide grin as Hidan was only beginning to recover from shock. The water slowly pulled Hidan into the air, out of his circle, and Shuuko stood to her feet and got out of immediate reach of the Jashin circle. "Wh-what the hell are you trying to pull?! Hidan sputtered, visibly panicking. Shuuko's grin grew wider, if possible. So Ritsuki hadn't abandoned her! Said black-head landed next to her, his hands in that familiar position that Shuuko knew all too well.

"What the hell are you trying to do?!" Hidan looked up, glaring daggers at Ritsuki. Ritsuki would have been a little bit more skittish, had Hidan's voice sounded less shaky. That fact just brought a smirk to Ritsuki's face. "I just have to squeeze tighter and you're dead." Hidan scoffed at that, fear abandoned. "I'm immortal, you little shit."

Even so, Ritsuki's smirk didn't waver. "But how are you gonna move when you're dismembered?" Shuuko saw the faintest trace of white enter the Jashinist's face, and she couldn't hold back a grin. However, their luck was cut in half when Hidan wriggled out of the water as if nothing had been holding him in the first place.

"That's it! I'm going to sacrifice you both to Jashin. I'm going to go totally ballistic, and let you both die a slow, painful, and fucking bloody death! Cower in fear, bitches!" With that, Hidan charged them both with incredible speed. Shuuko hadn't even gotten the chance to bat an eyelash (nevertheless dodge), before Hidan slashed his pike through her upper arm. This time around, he didn't run straight over to his circle, he continued slashing at her mercilessly, and laughing like it was the funniest thing in the world.

Ritsuki was doing a much better job than she was, in dodging that is. But even so, he still received a slash in his upper left cheek, and blood was soon dribbling down his face towards his chin. Shuuko also took a few hits, but all she did was screw her eyes shut and dodge the best she could. She hoped against hope that Hidan wouldn't suddenly turn to his circle once more while her eyes were still shut.

Hidan only laughed for a little while longer, until he received a kick straight across his cheek. That threw him immediately out of his happy mood. But it also only served to give him more of a bloodlust.

Seeing the horrendous look in Hidan's eyes, Ritsuki leaped out of his immediate vicinity, and Shuuko followed suit. Too bad that was the wrong thing to do.

Having already given _both_ of them a few nasty cuts, Hidan already had their blood dripping from his pike. With that, his strange circle wasn't that far away from him either.

He dashed towards said circle, and Ritsuki and Shuuko were on his tail just as quickly. Shuuko, though, was faster, despite the fact she had many more injuries than Ritsuki. Maybe it was just desperation, or she was internally panicking.

Luck still wasn't on their side, however, and Hidan slowed down as his feet entered the symbol, grinning maliciously. Shuuko only gasped and could just _feel_ the spike through her chest. She was oblivious to the fact that she was biting her lip, and the fact that Ritsuki stopped abruptly behind her.

Her scarlet eyes watched Hidan as if he were moving in slow motion. She was watching closely with her eyes, horrified and ready to die. She was so engrossed in the Jashinist's movements that she barely noticed the shadow zooming in around Hidan rapidly. The kunoichi only had the chance to let out a small breathless gasp, screw her eyes shut, and thrust her arms in front of her face like a shield. Not much protection, but Ritsuki was also leaning against her, and despite the situation at hand, she felt protected, but horror still overthrew that feeling.

Shuuko felt wisps of her hair and bangs hit her cheeks as dust filled the air, and something massive hit the ground not ten feet in front of them. Soon enough, she --along with Ritsuki-- hit the ground from the impact, and once her eyes were open once more, Hidan was crushed... by an enormous toad!

* * *

Both Gouta and Killer Bee also felt the impact of the large mass that hit the ground up ahead. Both of them just barely dodged the trees that had been ripped from their roots.

"What in the hell was that?" Killer Bee murmured from under his breath, but it was easily audible to Gouta who shrugged. "I dunno."

They thundered through the trees and landed, and the first thing they saw, was the toad.

* * *

Shuuko was ecstatic. A huge grin overtook her face and she looked up, her eyes gleaming. "Naruto!"

Ritsuki, on the other hand, didn't seem quite as happy. He didn't offer a hint of surprise even. Instead, he looked a mix of both boredom and fatigue, offering only a "great we get stuck with the obstreperous ninja," in response.

Shuuko ignored him completely. She was already on her feet, and had been so happy at Naruto's presence, she forget all about her injuries, Hidan, and the fact that Gouta and Killer Bee had arrived. She didn't even notice Roushi's absence...

"How'd you find us?! And is Gaara all right?" The girl asked, all smiles. Naruto flashed a smile just as stupidly. "Gaara's just fine, and he's alive." His smile was wiped clean off of his face then. "Too bad Chiyo-baasama had to sacrifice her life for him." But he was all smiles in a matter of two more seconds. "We returned him to Suna. While we were there, some guys told us shinobi that didn't belong to that village had been there asking about Gaara. So we called Kiba in and decided to investigate, thinking it was more Akatsuki members, but it was just you guys. Kiba led us to some screwed up sewer, then he abandoned me, so I summoned a toad to show me where you guys were."

Shuuko chuckled a bit. "But toads aren't like dogs!" Naruto shrugged languidly. "Their sense of smell is better than humans either way."

Their conversation was cut short when Gamabunta was slowly being somewhat, lifted. Hidan stepped out from under the amphibian, and if looks could kill, _all _of them would have been dead at lighting speed.

"I fucking swear I'm going to sacrifice every last one of you heathens to Jashin-sama. I'll kill you, sacrifice you, and then kill you a few more times over!"

No one bothered to ponder how in the hell Hidan would actually _accomplish_ that, he was at an unfortunate disadvantage, especially since it was five against one. Unless... Akatsuki members were as strong as the rumors said, and every shinobi alive knew they most certainly were.

Hidan stood up straighter and stretched. While he did so, he swung his scythe around in taunting circles. But no sooner had he licked his lips and took a step, had a voice penetrated everyone's ears.

"_Hidan, enough! Get your ass back to the base."_ At that, Hidan flinched, then scowled.

"Kakuzu, fuck you! You get your own ass back to the base! I need to finish these pus--"

"_The leader ordered it." _

Hidan grumbled something both incoherent and unheard, then shook his head. "Tell the leader that he's a bitch!"

"_Tell him yourself-- when you get back to the base." _

"I fucking hate you, Kakuzu." Hidan grumbled. He turned towards everyone present and sneered. "Don't worry, bitches. I'll return soon to sacrifice your bloody souls to Jashin-sama soon enough."

And with that, the Jashinist disappeared into smoke. Everyone blinked a few times in silence, but the blonde soon broke the ice. "Everyone! Hurry up and get on!"

You didn't have to tell the fatigued group of shinobi twice. Gamabunta was barreling off soon enough, with Naruto 'driving' and Shuuko taking 'shot-gun'.

A frown appeared on the semi-beat-up kunoichi's face. "Why do I feel as if we're missing something?"


	40. Anticipation for the Lost

_Chapter Forty: Anticipation for the Lost_

**Questions: **

**Elemental Dragon Swordman: Did Kakuzu capture Roushi?**

**Answer: No. This chapter will explain more. Much more. **

**Elemental Dragon Swordman: How did Hidan lift Gamabunta?**

**Answer: I guess I wasn't as descriptive as I wanted to be. He only lifted Gamabunta up enough to crawl out from under him. But still, that's rather strange in itself. Let's just say Hidan's insanely strong. I wouldn't think otherwise since he can wield around that giant scythe. **

* * *

Darkness was the setting and nine shinobi were engulfed into it. A strange sound like static emitted as they all appeared and when they spoke.

_"_The Sanbi is entering Kirigakure's great lake at this moment._" _A voice rose above the crackling , it was Zetsu's voice that had dispelled the information. His white-side. The Akatsuki nodded in his direction and then turned over towards Deidara who was on his left._ "_Deidara and Tobi will depart to capture that bijuu in a few days._" _Pein replied in a monotone. He turned straight ahead when both Deidara and Tobi stayed silent.

_"_Until then, it seems as if Roushi-san has abandoned his friends --left his haven, security and safety--, to investigate and try to get more information on the group that will soon capture and seal his bijuu. That alone will kill him, as a result._" _

_'_Idiot_' _was the only thing that one of the Akatsuki members could muster to say before Pein continued prattling.

_"_Kisame_," _Pein re-informed the Kiri-nin,_ "_that's your Jinchuuriki to go capture._" _The shark-nin broke into a wide and toothy grin, practically growing ecstatic. For once the Jinchuuriki was coming to them. Hidan noted this and flipped out._ "_Hey, that's not fair! I had to chase down my stupid Jinchuuriki, more over, I had to _track _her down._" _Kisame's grin didn't waver, though. He gave the younger silhouette who wasn't that far away from him (Kakuzu being between them) a snooty pout. He had tried to look sympathetic, but that attempt was in vain.

_"_You only had the two-tailed Jinchuuriki. She was much weaker anyway._" _Deidara, from across the entire room, frowned at that statement._ "_Master Kisame, excuse my rude cessation, but I wouldn't underestimate the Jinchuuriki, hm. It may have just been the one-tails, but he--_" _

The blonde was cut off by Hidan butting in in between laughter._ "_You got the easiest bijuu out of us all! It's not your place to be telling anyone not to underestimate the Jinchuuriki when you did so yourself, damn hypocrite. Besides, you're still a newbie here, Deidara-chan, you should just shut up and watch how the pros take down these assholes._" _

Deidara offered a sour look to the fuschia-eyed man, and retorted with,_ "_Hidan, I acceded this position as an Akatsuki-nin three years ago. I'm not a newbie anymore. Tobi has taken that position, hm._" _He waited a while for that to sink in, then continued._ "_And as for being assigned the job of capturing the Ichibi, you got the second weakest Jinchuuriki-- the Nibi, hm._" _

Hidan fumed and was about to retort with something more, but Pein silenced him with his hand. _"_Itachi, Kisame, head out right away for the Yonbi-Jinchuuriki._" _

The two indicated Akatsuki members nod, and without another word, they disappeared, leaving the other seven to listen to the continuous static.

_

* * *

_

Dew was sparkling on the greenery, but it was quickly shaken off with the flash, known as Roushi, zipped past. He was clothed in a pensive face and steely cold eyes the color of charcoal. He was dead-set on figuring out information on this group of S-class criminals, because the information from the Bingo Book just wasn't enough to satisfy his growing hunger for knowledge.

When Kakuzu had pummeled him into the ground and kicked him around like a ping-pong ball, something had suddenly interrupted them. It was the voice of a man named Pein. He was telling Kakuzu that he needed to grab Hidan and get back to the hideout as fast as he could.

That, in itself, made Roushi wonder what was going on. Sure enough, in the blink of an eye, Kakuzu had left Roushi just laying there, and disappeared into smoke. No explanation, no threats, nothing. And that was when the maroon-haired man found himself seriously doubted his own knowledge on Akatsuki. So, he had decided to investigate further on the matter.

Said Iwa-nin bounded off of a tree branch. Pain rang through his legs and he took an impromptu break, wincing and panting as he leaned against a tree. He wasn't in terrible condition, but Akatsuki-nin were nothing to be trifled with; they would kick your ass in seconds, they just_ chose _to toy with you. Or so it seemed.

Roushi hovered a palm over his shoulder. During their fight, at some point, it had been pulled out of its socket. He could do nothing more but force it back inside and continue fighting.

Oh how he regretted doing that. The old man crouched low and sighed, removing his headband and running a hand through his red ponytail. He was in his late fifties (fifty-six, to be exact), but as many old people say, 'he was nothing like he used to be'. He was getting way too old for this. And then, it hit him; today was his birthday. He was fifty-seven today. Now. Right now. Damn.

Roushi sighed again and stood back up, pushing the pain far aside. He really was getting too old for this.

_

* * *

_

Naruto and co. were currently earning an earful from Gamabunta. The poor summon had been forced to carry all of the shinobi all through the night, and he wasn't in the mood to continue lugging them around that morning. Dew was sparkling on the passing trees and plants, and the sky was colored hues of pale blue and purple and light yellow. "Naruto! Get your bratty friends off my back! Stop off somewhere."

Naruto was in awe for five seconds or less, but then he just frowned._ "_Boss, we're trying to get to the village as fast as possible... Besides, you're strong enough to carry us all._" _The toad snorted._ "_That doesn't me I_ want _to carry you all."

The run-through with Hidan had happened the night before. Now that it was dawn, the only thing the ragtag group of Jinchuuriki wanted to do was sleep for the rest of the day. Save for Naruto, of course. He had been up most, if not all of the night. Trying to spark a conversation on Shuuko's behalf. She was gracious, none the less, and talked with the restless blonde. Until she conked out in the middle of his explanation of how he learned his summoning jutsu. With that, he was left to talk to the wind. Of course, he hadn't noticed until she began snoring, and that was when the story was, more or less, half finished.

It would take another two or so days to get back to the safety of the Leaf Village, but it seemed as if everyone skipped out on one small detail.

Everyone except Killer Bee.

He was the only one well aware that Roushi wasn't present. The other three were dead-tired; they passed the nagging feelings in their head off as the absence of chakra. Naruto, also hadn't even begin think about Yugito's absence. But a tired and teary-eyed Shuuko had explained what had happened with Rikuto. And Gamabunta was anything but happy about letting a two day old corpse ride on his back. And Killer Bee complained over the smell.

Naruto crossed his arms across his chest._ "_Just two more days, boss. Then you can drop us off and return to wherever summons return to._" _Naruto tried to negotiate, but Gamabunta wasn't having any of it._ "_I want you to go find some place to go_ now." _Naruto was at a lost. So he decided to wake Shuuko up. Without someone else who wasn't willing to leave the toad's back, they were in a stalemate.

The blonde nudged Shuuko who was sleeping with her back to him. She had taken Gouta's overcoat as a blanket. The green-haired only stirred--just barely. So Naruto prodded her a few times. She blinked and got up, rubbing her eyes and yawning. After a while, everyone else was up, two of which were still scorning Naruto for their rude wake-up call.

Then, after a tortuous argument about whether or not to leave Gamabunta, they were soon on their way to a village that Gouta had spotted on a map. The vermilion-colored toad finally found an expensive hotel as the sun was just setting.

_

* * *

_

Roushi had just entered enemy territory. The branch rocked violently as he fell on top of it and surveyed Kirigakure below. With all his years as a shinobi, he caught onto Kakuzu's trail in no time. Surprisingly enough, he hadn't even tried to cover up his tracks. A frown crossed the old man's face as he looked around at the village.

_"_This isn't a good battlefield for my fire element._" _he replied to the wind. True, Suiton element whooped Katon's ass any day.

_"_But as long as I don't end up fighting on an ocean,_" _the maroon-haired man reassured himself aloud,_ "_I'll be fine." Too bad Roushi didn't know how wrong he was.

_

* * *

_

Back at the luxurious hotel in the unnamed, non-shinobi village, the band of Jinchuuriki were currently 'relaxing' in the hot springs. Shuuko, being the only female, felt quite lonely. She had even adapted to talking to herself in the abandoned haven.

The green-haired girl turned towards the wall that separated the womens' bath from the mens', and peered at the nighttime sky. _"_It's so beautiful out... But there's a lot of wind._" _

As if on cue, a gust of wind blew past her face, and laughter boomed from over the wall. She was only half surprised knowing that it came from Naruto's mouth. As soon as they had awaken, Naruto had been talking a mile a minute (much to Ritsuki's annoyance). Sooner or later, the laughter died into the night, and Shuuko couldn't help but smile and offer a giggle at that. At that moment, it dawned upon her, for the first time, that the nagging feeling in the back of her mind disappeared. And as it faded, she remembered that Roushi had been absent all this time.

Finishing up her bath, the Shichibi Jinchuuriki quickly donned a nice purple kimono, and hurried off into the night._ Maybe, by chance, he somehow got lost. Maybe he'll come back soon. _She also considered, --for a brief moment-- that she couldn't stop saying maybe. _"_Where did he run off too? I... I hope he's okay..._" _A warm hand fell atop her shoulder, making her jump out of her skin. Jerking around, Shuuko's scarlet eyes met ones hidden behind sunglasses.

_"_Killer Bee?!_" _The kunoichi let out a breath she hadn't known she'd been holding. She also didn't fail to notice that, unlike her, Killer Bee was in his normal attire.

_"_Don't worry._" _

Those were empty words without elaboration, so he explained. _"_Roushi will be fine... despite the stupid decision he made._" _Shuuko had half a mind to ask what stupid decision that was, exactly. But she didn't. She didn't want to think that anything bad was happening. She was having such a fun day, she didn't want to think that Roushi was in trouble, or that he had one foot in his grave.

So, she didn't ask those questions. She pushed them to the far back of her head, and changed the subject. _"_I'm surprised that you're out of the bath already._" _She replied, her voice breaking a bit. Evidently, Shuuko's abilities didn't lie in masking exactly what she was thinking then and there. So the Hachibi Jinchuuriki reverted back to the subject that was really on her mind. _"_Roushi's fine, don't worry about him._" _Too bad that 'Hachibi-sama' didn't have the same view. But Killer Bee wasn't going to talk about that. He wasn't going to worry Shuuko any further than need be.

His face betrayed his promise.

The reassurance and warmth crumpled into a worried frown that stayed on his face. Shuuko noticed that in an instant. _"_What's wrong?_" _

Lucky for Killer Bee, he was interrupted by the door to the mens' bath sliding open. Also lucky for Killer Bee, Shuuko had a short attention span. Mostly. _"_Ritsuki! You're out of the bath early too. Why?_"_ Again, she didn't fail to notice he was also in his normal attire. Just this time, his robe didn't reveal any of his chest and was tied tightly with the sash.

Said black-head rubbed at his temples miserably. _"_Naruto's driving me nuts; he won't shut up. So I snuck out._" _Shuuko didn't even try to stifle her giggle. _ "_Naruto's always like that._" _For the second time of the day, as if on cue, something happened. Naruto came out of the bath frowning.

"Ritsuki? Why the hell did you leave? I didn't even finish the story where I kicked Hyuuga Neji's butt in the Chunin Exams._" _Ritsuki only offered a groan and Shuuko was laughing once more.

Killer Bee had been totally blocked out of the conversation from then on. He had no objection to it though. He just hoped for the best for Roushi.


	41. A Heart's Whisper

_Chapter Forty-One: A Heart's Whisper_

Having nightmares about enemy ninja was understandable, but having nightmares about your best friend was just downright scary. But Shuuko was certain she wasn't having a nightmare, she was _living_ through one. More than once had she felt her heartbeat hasten and then stop completely not a second later. She was a pathetic jumble of emotions, and was torn between sobbing her tear ducts dry, or making a mad dash while screaming her lungs out.

She would have chose the latter if her legs didn't feel as limp as jello. She was surprised she could still stand, let alone run. Scarlet eyes snapped wider, and she could feel the hot breath hitting her cheeks constantly. The tension in the air was, for lack of a better description, suffocating. She had sworn her heart virtually skipped a beat when the Rokubi turned to look at her. Eyes; pupil-less. The bijuu's entire form made her quiver. And that didn't help since she was already sweating buckets. It finally dawned upon her that this _demon_ ready to attack her, was Ritsuki! That just simply killed her. But she, nonetheless, kept her tears hidden, though the effort stung her eyes.

This was the Ritsuki she pronounced as the first other Jinchuuriki she had ever met.

This was the Ritsuki that had acquiesced in her decision to jump on the 'Jinchuuriki-finding bandwagon'.

This as the Ritsuki that had woken her up in the middle of the night with nightmares. Not intentionally, of course.

This was the Ritsuki that had taken on Deidara.

This was the Ritsuki that she had crawled through the bushes with.

This was the Ritsuki she had _almost_ shared her first kiss with.

This was the Ritsuki that had protected her from Hidan.

This was the Ritsuki that was ready to kill her. Right now.

_"It wasn't true! It _couldn't_ be true!"_ Her whispering heart reiterated. No. This wasn't that Ritsuki. Was it?

Shuuko watched the three tails, half made of chakra, swirl back and forth like a swinging pendulum. The Rokubi was bearing its teeth before it attacked her head-on. But its claws just scratched against medal.

A kunai? No. A windmill shuriken? No-- a sword! More like a zanbatō.

"Killer Bee?!"

Shuuko cursed inwardly. Why was she always getting saved like this? In no time, Naruto and Gouta were standing at attention, also ready to attack. "Why is this happening?" Shuuko murmured as she watched Killer Bee struggle in a battle to knock the Rokubi off balance. The attempt was in vain. That was when she remembered. Ritsuki did that most, if not every night when he fell asleep. Exactly like Gaara, Ritsuki needed to stay awake in order to ensure that the Rokubi didn't take over and eradicate (and/or) level the entire village.

Wanting to help in _some _way, Shuuko stripped herself of the red pack attached to her back. Gouta could only let out a mere "what are you doing?!", and Naruto could only yell, "Shuuko?!", before she stepped from behind Killer Bee and swung the seemingly heavy pack at the bijuu.

However, she wasn't fast enough, and the Rokubi lashed the second tail at Shuuko, hitting her on her _left_ arm and sending her to the ground. All that was there was a dirt-covered bruise. She would definitely see _and_ feel it in the morning when she used that arm.

If the kunoichi hadn't felt betrayed before, she certainly did now. Ritsuki had just _attacked_ her! It was of course very different from when she had first met him and he had trapped her in that bubble jutsu of his. That was very different. This, on the other hand, wasn't. She shook her head roughly, as if to shake the memories and terrible allegations out of her head. No-- this wasn't Ritsuki. This was the Rokubi. The Rokubi had those pupil-less, dead eyes. Ritsuki's eyes were black and seemed ethereal. The difference was clear.

Shuuko glared at the Rokubi. She _was not_ going to be the pathetic little fangirl. She'd done that long enough. She was going to stop being so useless, pathetic, and draped over Ritsuki like some useless ragdoll. Looking up, she noticed immediately those hollow eyes the Rokubi had. Its head was towards her, and she could tell it was watching her, waiting for her to make any sudden movements. Why? To snap her neck like a twig of course. Gouta and Naruto had fallen back (much to Naruto's disappointment), and they were just waiting on the sidelines now. Killer Bee was still looking for the best tactic. With Roushi gone for now, he was their temporary replacement. Why? Because he was the second oldest, of course.

Scarlet eyes made contact with empty, malevolent and hollow holes again. The beast snarled at her. Shuuko tried her hardest not to look at those creepy eyes, instead her eyes drifted to the tails that were currently swishing around wildly. Looking at them made Shuuko actually notice that the the form was halfway to bearing all six tails. The same neon blue tails sent wind smacking against her face and blowing hair in her mouth and on the sides of her face. The outside 'skin', so to speak, was golden. Shuuko was again aware of the suffocating air, and just then, she noticed why the air was so heavy.

The Rokubi was swirling around _chakra_!

The blue life source, so to speak, was being swirled around the area with the Rokubi's tails. Whatever it was trying to do, it wasn't good. If she was going to stop him, she have to kill him. She's have to kill _her_ Ritsuki.

Withdrawing a kunai and twirling it around her finger, she headed straight for the demon. "Shuuko?! What the hell are you doing?!" Naruto dashed off after her, but unlike Shuuko, he was stopped mid-way by Gouta. Shuuko knew for a fact that the Rokubi was sealed inside Ritsuki's heart, if she were to kill them both, she'd have to stab him there. That was the only place she could think of to kill the Rokubi. If only she could find some other place that wouldn't result in killing Ritsuki...

Yet again, Shuuko forced herself not to cry. She had long since tuned Gouta, Naruto, and Killer Bee's frantic yelling out. The sound was replaced with the thundering _thump_ of her heartbeat. After what seemed like decades to her, she entered dangerous vicinity of the Rokubi. That in itself was just too close for Killer Bee's comfort. He yelled warnings at the girl but she didn't seem to be hearing him. Either that, or she was ignoring him. She simply rose the weapon, forcing chakra into it for good measure. With one wistful glance down at the demon, she plunged the blade straight at the Rokubi's chest.

She missed the heart.

So instead of scissoring herself out for another try, she began dragging the blade down the chest. She was absolutely positive the Rokubi was roaring and screaming its lungs out; its entire chest was very sensitive. The demon usually protected its chest scarily enough that you couldn't even get as close as Shuuko was to it. She dropped to the ground from her leap, and ended up face-to-face with the bijuu. Her expression didn't waver as said demon roared in her face. As she dragged the kunai downwards, she felt herself getting close to a curve of some sort, but her hand was stopped and jerked out. That resorted to more yowling from the Rokubi. Unwillingly, she dropped the kunai to the ground, just as she felt a weight hit the back of her head.

Then and there, everything went black.

_~X~X~_

Shuuko was half-surprised when she saw Ritsuki sleeping soundly beside her. And she was absolutely sure that she let out the biggest sigh of relief in her life. So it had just been one messed up nightmare. Luckily, it was all over now. She was in the safety of the hotel room, Gouta, Killer Bee, Ritsuki, and a snoring Naruto were by her side, and everything was all right. Except... Roushi was no where to be found. But that was okay. Gouta said that he would track down the old man in the morning.

Shuuko sighed and rolled over to look at the window. The sun was streaming in and hurting her eyes. The kunoichi scrunched them closed once more. She could sleep a while longer. And with that, her scarlet eyes snapped shut until further in the day. Then, she was awoken by Naruto's voice.

"I'm hungry! Can we eat breakfast now?" Naruto whined. She could have sworn she saw Gouta roll his eyes slightly. "Soon, Naruto. Let's just pack up and get ready to leave." Naruto jumped at that. "Leave everything to me!" And so, the hyperactive blonde whisked back and forth, shoving everyone's possessions into their bags. Shuuko smiled at this, but continued watching Naruto make shadow clones to get the job done faster.

"Done! Can we go eat now? I'm starving." Naruto replied with a grin. The shadow clones around him popped. Gouta gave the room a quick look over, then nodded. "All right, let's go." "Yeah!" Naruto was out of the room so fast everyone had to make sure all of the shadow clones were gone. "Shuuko, let's go." Killer Bee promptly called outside the room. The girl just nodded and propped herself up. Pain shot through her arm, though. Scarlet eyes danced down towards her _left_ arm.

She was shocked to see a bruise, covered with a little bit of dirt.


	42. The Seven Swordsmen's Fallen Light

_Chapter Forty-Two: The Seven Swordsmen's Fallen Light_

Kirigakure ―preferably the Mist village― was such an interesting place, to say the least. It was somewhat... relaxing; all of the steamy mist filling the air. It was almost like a perpetual hot spring. Roushi was currently strolling through the Mist village, sucking on a popsicle, and flipping through an old Kiri record book. Sure, he was just taking his sweet time, but it wasn't like the Akatsuki were going to give up on capturing him. They were going to continue to pursue him, whether he took his time to revitalize or not. So he might as well rest up while he could. He had gotten a few winks of sleep, and was actually eating _food_, not soldier pills. (Well, popsicles might not have been the best sustenance.)

Kirigakure had many natural medicines abound, most of which the main ingredient was (obviously) water. Thanks to a kind medical ninja, he felt ready for any fight at the moment. Of course, that didn't mean that the medic hadn't been suspicious. He had simply told her that he was on a mission in this village. It wasn't a complete lie, but at least it was one to boot.

The maroon-haired man continued down the streets of the Water country, all the while enjoying his frozen treat. He turned a page of the record book he had snagged from the medical ninja, and saw a chapter titled, _'The Seven Mist Swordsmen_._' _ That topic seemed interesting enough, so he began reading.

Momochi Zabuza. He'd never heard of him, and that was strange in itself, considering how old Roushi was. The next page― Kurosuki Raiga. He'd heard of him. The Lighting Country was closer to Iwa than the Water country was. Then, he turned the page to see Hoshigaki Kisame. Of course he knew him.

After reading about the Akatsuki-nin, he couldn't help but wonder who the Akatsuki might be sending out to capture him now, considering Roushi had killed Kisame in the sewer with the ceiling collapse jutsu. The old man thought back to when he had first heard about his captor, Kisame in the Bingo Book. That had been a year ago. Turning a few more pages, Roushi skimmed the intro page about the the Seven Swordsmen Students. Then he turned to read about Houzuki Suigetsu.

So he had been studying about becoming a Mist swordsmen, as well. Roushi read over Suigetsu's biography, then turned the page to find a shock.

Biting his lip, Roushi skimmed over the half-blank page. Maybe he shouldn't have been as surprised, but he still couldn't believe none other than Rikuto was on that page! His biography was absolutely blank, save for his name and a picture of the stoic Jinchuuriki. Roushi mentally cursed himself. Why hadn't he done a background check on Rikuto?! Who knew what kind of things he was affiliated with. He should've checked Rikuto's body, or had given it to tracker-nin, but Rikuto was already rotting in his grave.

Roushi closed the book and switched to an old Kiri Bingo Book. Haku was on the first page. Surprisingly, Roushi had heard of this young Kiri-nin, but not about his master. Roushi flipped the through a few more names and pages, noting which ones he had heard about, or which ones he knew. After looking for a while, he was shocked so badly, he felt as if a decade of his life had been cut off. Again, Rikuto's face was also on a page.

Why was he in _this_ book?!

Roushi soon found out, sooner than he had expected. It appeared that Rikuto had a wealth of information about the Akatsuki. That sent Roushi seriously thinking. Now that he really thought about it, Rikuto had been pretty mysterious. They hadn't learned anything about him. Just that he was a Kiri-nin (his headband was to thank for that), the Sanbi Jinchuuriki, and that his name was Rikuto. They hadn't even known how old he was or what kind of skills he possessed. Aside from his medical ninjutsu, of course. And that he worked with a staff. Now thinking about it, the flower on the staff had had a peculiar flower on it. A green camilla.

He had seen a fairly large amount of them, somewhere in Kiri. Then it hit him. In the medical-ninja's office. She had had those strange flowers in her home. Was that where Rikuto had learned medical ninjutsu? And since Rikuto knew a lot about the Akatsuki―probably thanks to the Sanbi―, he might have been ordered to die so the information wasn't leaked. But did that mean that the Akatsuki might have made their move the year when all the Jinchuuriki had been split apart?

That was when Roushi was, again, enlightened.

If he could get to the Sanbi before the Akatsuki, he might be able to obtain that knowledge that leads to the Akatsuki's downfall. Roushi attained a bird and attached a message to it. If he could just tell the others to catch up with him...

"What do you think you're doing?" Looking up, Roushi, for the third time that day, in less than thirty minutes, was shocked.

Kisame was still alive and flashing him that same wry grin. As deftly and discreetly as he possibly could, Roushi sent the bird off, in hopes that it might reach the other Jinchuuriki before the Akatsuki found the Sanbi. Spitting out the bare popsicle stick, Roushi concealed the books into his back pocket before melting into a fighting stance.

Sure he was rested up, but luck wasn't on his side. For he was standing right in the middle of an ocean.


	43. Only in a Dream

_Chapter Forty-Three: Only in a Dream_

"Shuuko, do you think we're going the right way? Shuuko? Shuuko?!" The celadon-haired girl bolted upright, her face looking exactly like a shocked kid who had just been caught with a hand inside the cookie jar. Face it, the dream was absolutely, one-hundred percent real. Her eyes drifted down to the bruise on her arm. That bad thing was, that wasn't the only proof she had gotten.

Ritsuki had layer after layer of bandages wrapped haphazardly around his chest. During that morning, she had been gabbing with Naruto about a mission he and Sakura had had. (He seemed to be doing that a lot lately.) Out of her peripheral vision, she had heard him wincing as he fumbled with said bandages.

The first time she had asked him what had happened (although she very well knew what had happened), he had grumbled a simple _"_Nothing._" _The second time, he had told her it was _"_just a few scars from crawling through the forest._" _A blatant lie, even for him. But it wasn't like he was acting any different than usual: he had stayed quiet all morning and hid in the background when everyone else was laughing about a poem Killer Bee had composed.

Nobody found it strange, so no one bothered to question him.

It wasn't even _that_ surprising when he was found blowing bubbles throughout the hotel room. Everytime she looked at him, she saw the Rokubi instead of Ritsuki. She needed to talk to someone about it. And, --even if she didn't want to admit it-- she was still being stubborn and skeptical (at least, a little part of her was) that the whole incident, had, in fact been a dream. And she was sure as hell Ritsuki wouldn't be the person she would ask.

Gouta turned out to be the unlucky victim.

_~X~X~ _

They were currently on Gamabunta's back (yet again), hopping along. Leaving the front of the toad, Shuuko crawled to the back. She was still a little unsure of walking on a mobile summon, and the ground was so far away...

"Where are you going?" Naruto called. Shuuko looked back with a grin. "I'll be right back." Naruto was left baffled. Crawling over to Gouta, she sat on her heels. "Can I talk to you for a sec?" she whispered. Gouta looked around as if someone would be spying on them, then offered a nod. Straightening up, the twenty-year-old frowned. "Why are you whispering?" Shuuko, in lieu of answering, continued whispering.

"Why's Ritsuki all bandaged up?" And at that moment, Shuuko could have swore on her life that Gouta had paled, ever so slightly.

* * *

"I thought I had killed you." Roushi growled, all the while sporting the most heinous face he could, and for a Jinchuuriki, that's pretty heinous. Kisame just smirked and replied with, "You thought wrong." Roushi's coal eye slid over to Itachi.

The Uchiha was sitting there, dispassionate as always.

Charocal eyes hit scarlet ones, and two wheels added to his Sharingan. Roushi recoiled ever so slighly. So he was standing right in the middle of an ocean and he was about to battle two _Akatsuki_ members, one that must know the area like the back of his hand, and the other who has water as a secondary element. Well, that was more or less reassuring. You could practically call the battle a stalemate withought even seeing it through.

They were Akatsuki members, but he was a Jinchuuriki.

They were Suiton-savvy, but hell, he had Doton!

There were two of them, but he had a _bijuu_ on his side.

Then the idea of Itachi's Sharingan came into play...

Not good.

But sitting there like a rock wasn't going to change anything. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, anyway.

Kisame began deftly creating hand seals, when he finished, he shouted out (his hands still frozen in the _Hitsuji_ seal) "_Suikoudan no Jutsu_!" Instantly, a water dragon burst through the water, and on pure reflex alone, Roushi leapt away backwards.

He was currently thinking of how he was going to counter the elemental beast, or get away from it. Said water dragon swirled around underneath Roushi, and the older man was soon trapped underwater.

* * *

The intent to kill something --or someone-- had never been so strong inside Shuko as it was when the messenger bird interupted her and Gouta's conversation. It had been one-sided, really; Shuuko urged Gouta to speak as he fumbled around with words. Killer Bee got hold of the bird and took the message from its foot.

"What's it say?" Naruto asked, struggling to look over the older Jinchuuriki's shoulder. "Jinchuuriki-sama" ignored the blonde and began grumbling incoherently what the message said. After a few excruciating minutes, Killer Bee looked up after rolling up the message.

"Well?" Naruto countered. With bated breath, everyone waited for the worst. In lieu, Killer Bee whipped out his book of poems and rhymes and proceeded to write something down inside of it. "Killer Bee?! What the hell did the note say?" Shuuko asked. Truth be told, she didn't care what the note said at all. Naruto rolled his eyes when he didn't get an answer. He reached over and snagged the message from Killer Bee's side, and with that, he began to read it aloud:

_Naruto, Shuuko, Gouta, Killer Bee, and Ritsuki, _

_I am currently peregrinating in Kirigakure. I've taken possession of a Bingo book and old Kiri records, with them, I have been enlighted on some interesting information about Rikuto. He was said to know a thing or two about the Akatsuki, even though a 'thing or two' is hardly explaining how much knowledge he has on the matter. Rikuto is seemed to be wanted for his vast amount of information about the Akatsuki, most likely the information was told to him by the Sanbi. I know for a fact that the Sanbi is currently residing in one of Kiri's great lakes. From you all, I would like you to get to Kiri as fast as possible. When you do, get as much infromation from the Sanbi about Akatsuki as you can (_before _the Akatsuki show up). I will meet up with you after I finish fighting Uchiha Itachi and Hoshigaki Kisame. -Roushi _

Naruto dropped the letter at his feet. "Old man Roushi's fighting Itachi... and Kisame? I've seen them before..." Shuuko blinked a few times. "Oh, you said that a while back."

"They might know a thing or two about where Sasuke is..."

Everyone stared at the blonde, for his voice had dropped down a few notches. He was practically murmuring now. "Does anyone know the way to Kiri?" Killer Bee asked, forever scrawling verses down in his book. "I think I remember. It was years ago when I last went, but I think I still know the way." Naruto surprised everyone by saying. "We'll be faster on foot," the blonde replied wisely.

Everyone nodded, and Team Jinchuuriki switched tactics. From then on, if the Akatsuki were really threatening to get to Kiri first, it would be a race to the Water Country!

* * *

Roushi deftly gathered a large amount of chakra. With it, he blew out a gargantuan fireball that shot across the ocean at blinding speed. That alone transformed the lethal water dragoninto a cup-full of harmless water droplets.

Test success! A fireball did cause the drops to nearly evaporate. _But_ he had to use a incredulous amount of chakra to do so. And he had a hunch that Kisame wasn't going to let up with these water beasts. With that noted, he was going to be out of chakra in no time.

Kisame looked up to see his dragon, for lack of a better description, completely eradicated. _What a pity... _

Itachi also caught sight of the pathetic water returning to the ocean as a whole. His eyes slide over to interrogate Kisame, his eyes giving him a look as if to say, 'That was pitiful.' The shark-looking man took wind of this, and unleashes that toothy grin of his.

"I'll take him down by myself, Itachi-san. You just sit back and watch." Itachi, of course, didn't respond. Without warning, Kisame threw off his enormous sword and charged Roushi. It was a pitiful attack, really; he'd just leap out of the way.

Too bad he couldn't.

The aquamarine waters were wrapped around the Yonbi Jinchuuriki's legs, holding him in place. And with a shark that eats chakra hurling closer, he was screwed.


	44. A Glimpse of the Yonbi

_Chapter Forty-Four: A Glimpse of the Yonbi _

Roushi did what he could to protect himself. That entailed making the stupid mistake known as jutting out his hands to block Samehada. Blood hit the waters and Roushi recoiled-- as much as a man restricted to little or no movement could, anyway. In a flash, Kisame had snatched his precious weapon away from the older man, another attack heading his way. And the maroon-haired man was sure he wouldn't be as lucky dodging this time.

Thinking quickly, albeit recklessly the maroon-haired man threw an explosive tag aimed at the liquid-made shackles. He failed to notice that he might have gotten detonated right along with the binds, which he very well might have. Luckily, only the 'hands' binding him down blew into water vapor, a sparse few transforming into innocuous droplets.

The old shinobi acted as quickly as he thought, again, his action being rash. Itachi watched on the sidelines, expecting Kisame to be nothing short of trigger-happy. The shark-nin readied himself for a frontal attack. Instead, Kisame received his weapon being snatched from his very own hands. And Roushi was hightailing his ass out of there without any other words being said.

Of course, that only proved to make the wounds on his palms deeper. And blood was rapidly sprinkling in ripples into the ocean. As Roushi was making his great escape, he abruptly stopped in front of the Uchiha. Thinking quickly yet again, the Yonbi Jinchuuriki reared back an arm and swung the huge sword at the Uchiha. Itachi simply and effortlessly dodged said slashes, with a sequence of ducks and backflips.

Finally being able to stand up straight again, the Uchiha prepared his eyes for _Tsukuyomi_. But Roushi would have none of that. Whirling around swiftly from the eyes that would end the battle right then and there, he ran straight into the shark-nin, almost dropping the sword from fright alone. Why hadn't he been able to sense his chakra?

Even if it was unexpected, Roushi lunged sideways out of the way at speed. Barely. After a rushed one-handed back hand-spring, black eyes hit yellow. Kisame's punch hit the air, but he swiftly backed up to send Roushi a lateral kick. Luckily, Roushi made Samehada oscillate at every one of Kisame's power-packed punches and kicks.

This wasn't good. He was dodging with one hand, and for whatever reason, he was feeling slower, weaker. What was going on? Kisame's fist made contact with Roushi's cheek, and the man hit the ground (water) running. Literally. Kisame was towering up on him by the time he looked up again. And for the sake of getting the man away from him, Roushi turned his simple upper kick into a windmill kick, his heel reaching Kisame's chin.

He was back on his feet by the time Samehada hit the water. Strangely enough, the sword was upside-down. With the absence of the sword, pain shot through the Jinchuuriki's arms. But for what reason?

Roushi simply back-flipped onto the hilt, keeping chakra to stay on top, albeit wobbly. Normally, he'd be able to stay up there with the elegance of a crane, but now his chakra seemed to be... drained. From the hilt, Roushi looked up to notice Kisame wasn't coming after him. In lieu, he was creating a long chain of hand seals, and when he was finished, Roushi noticed the seals a bit too late.

With the _slap_ of Kisame's palm on the water, another bigger dragon appeared, opening its mouth to let out a soundless roar._ This one, unlike the last, can't be simply outran, _Roushi noted, sighing. The maroon-haired man skidded off of Samehada. "_Katon: Gokakyuu no jutsu_!" He brought up two fingers to his mouth to help ignite the fire, and created the biggest fireball he had _ever_ made. He was sure of that.

Inches away from his face, the water dragon evaporated, and that did it for Roushi's chakra. The old man fell to the ground, limply, onto his knees. He wouldn't survive the rest of this battle.

_Unless... _

Kisame landed in front of Roushi, and offered a kick to his chest. Said Jinchuuriki skidded across the water on his side.

_Unless..._

The Akatsuki-nin spotted his weapon of choice laying on the water's edge, he strolled over to it and placed it on his shoulder. "You must have forgotten that my sword eats chakra." Roushi mentally slapped himself. Hard. At the moment, he had just enough chakra to create two lava clones--no, not even a full lava clone. He was _that_ drained. Now the tables were turned. He wasn't getting out of this battle alive.

_Unless... Unless I use the Yonbi's limitless chakra. _

After nonchalantly slapping his hands to his pants to wipe off the blood (to no avail, I might add), Roushi shut his eyes and focused. In seconds, Kisame could _taste _the palpable chakra lingering in the air. His eyes fell on Roushi. A tail had slicked out and seemed to crystallize. And without warning, the tawny tail streaked out from behind Roushi and slapped Kisame's sword, ever-so-slightly. And the shark-nin was semi-surprised to see part of the sword _melted_.

Kisame immediately reacted by backpedalling, making seals as he did. _Torrents_ of water roared up from the ocean and encompassed Roushi, pulling him underwater in an instant. After a few agonizing moments, the water explodes upward in a reverse waterfall. And with that, there was no more ocean, and steam simply replaced it.

Slouched over, a two-tailed Roushi stared at Kisame, daring him to move. And for once, the Akatsuki-nin showed an expression that wasn't smug-- shock. _The black marking over his nose and cheeks has spread across his eyes... _

The former ocean literally rained down above them for quite a while. And Roushi sat there, wondering how many ways he could rip Kisame up. Out of his peripheral vision, he noticed something insignificant at the moment. A bird? The odd thing was, was the altitude; the bird was incredibly high in the air. Too high to be normal. It looked about as big as a paper airplane, from where the old man stood. It was white, too. Maybe a dove...


	45. Race for the Sanbi

_Chapter Forty-Five: Race for the Sanbi_

The bird was very much a hawk, thank you. But what was actually scarier (altitude not included) than an _all_ white hawk, were the bird's passengers. Even more Akatsuki nin-- just what Roushi needed. But lucky for the old man, these Akatsuki members weren't going to attack him. In fact, they weren't even aware he, Itachi, and Kisame were positioned below them. Unlucky for Roushi, those Akatsuki members were after the Sanbi. If they reached Isonade first, it would ruin his chance to figure out the secret know as the Akatsuki.

Roushi just wasn't exactly sure as to how he was going to get the Sanbi to divulge that information to the team he had sent out...

Who cared! He was currently tied up at the moment. And he didn't have time to worry about a passing dove...

_~X~X~ _

Deidara noticed the lack of water in what was supposed to be an ocean. He and Tobi were the Akatsuki-nin surmounted atop the bird's back. Why? They were on a mission, of course. Like the leader had said, the two were sent out not too long after to capture the Sanbi, a now Jinchuuriki-less Bijuu. Deidara was just wondering how much of a fight the three-tailed demon was going to put up. The Sanbi was Tobi's Bijuu to capture, but he honestly doubted even Tobi was strong enough to beat a _Bijuu_, of all things.

Now that the blonde really thought of it, Tobi hadn't exactly fought anything or anyone. Not even verbally. Speaking defensively was one thing, but arguing was another, he supposed. _Tobi must have something up his sleeve. Otherwise he wouldn't even _be_ Akatsuki. _Deidara thought to himself, averting his eyes from the sides of the bird to Tobi himself. _Or it could be a_ _façade... _Tobi was a mystery. Not as much of an enigma Sasori had chalked himself up to be, but pretty damn close. Very close. Close enough to have Deidara acquire insatiable curiosity.

Everything about Tobi was... obscure, simply put. And why the hell did he wear that mask? Deidara's contemplating was cut off when he noticed something. The ocean-- at least where one was _supposed_ to be. He frowned a bit.He could have sworn on his life that there had been an ocean around here somewhere, according to the map, that is. _Maybe it was off somewhere else,_ he surmised carelessly, throwing the idea away.

And now that all of the water had _somehow_ disappeared, gargantuan pawprints (Well, Deidara could only think of them as being paw prints. There was no way in hell they belonged to a human.)

That was when he noticed, the Sanbi had probably walked. (More like dragged, the Sanbi was the absolute slowest Bijuu. _Maybe that was why he was given to __**Tobi**__..._Deidara couldn't help but wonder.)

His mind was quickly torn away from the 'pawprints' when he felt a slight drop in elevation. He also noticed steam! Below, there was _raw_ chakra, and incredibly strong chakra. The blue-eyed blonde decided to simply drop the idea of Tobi and the 'pawprints'. If he didn't keep his eyes ahead to navigate, the bird would take a nose-dive. That wasn't something they needed then.

_~X~X~ _

The sight of the Yonbi was unnerving. To say the least. Kisame could have sworn that the demon's baleful glare hadn't left him for a second. He was still pleading Kisame to move, even just a little. Why? So he could rip him to pieces, of course. He already had two tails swirling around. And he had received bonus points for turning the entire ocean to rain (that was currently still showering down on them). And with the ocean destroyed, so to speak, that had squashed all of Kisame's chances of being the victor of this battle.

Without his main _Suiton_ element, what did he have to defend himself against Roushi's fire? Sure, Itachi and the Yonbi-Jinchuuriki could still head off in an all out _Katon_-element battle, but how strong was a single Akatsuki member against a _Bijuu_?

It was up to his Sharingan, then. But could Bijuu even fall victim to genjutsu? He doubted it; he had never seen any _normal_ animal fall victim to illusions. Speaking of animals... what exactly _was_ the Yonbi? Yeah, yeah, he knew that the Yonbi was the four-tailed Bijuu, but what _was_ it. And what kind of animal had black markings over the nose and cheeks? A badger or something? No, considering that a strange dim lining of jagged chakra surrounded the Jinchuuriki. What were those supposed to symbolize?

Feathers.

So the Yonbi must be some kind of _bird_. A sparrow? No-- that seemed too... tame. But Kisame had no time to be thinking of that, it was irrelevant after all. He just wanted to get out _alive_.

But he couldn't help but wonder... And he was a bird after all, where the hell was the beak? But with Roushi's scary-ass eyes, he couldn't even fit a _beak_ of all things into the picture. And as if Roushi was one of Sasori's puppets, he seemed forced --to say the least-- to open his mouth. Out of it came some strange kind of gray steam or gas.

"Oh, shit!" Kisame leapt backwards out of the immediate vicinity of the gas. That was poison! Oh, yeah, he was screwed.

_~X~X~ _

Naruto was leading 'Team Jinchuuriki' (Roushi called them) into Kiri's border by noon. Their job was to get the Sanbi and wait for Roushi to catch up. Well,_ that _wasn't happening. Instead, the group was going to help Roushi, _then_ they were going to talk --interrogate-- the Kiri Bijuu.

Naruto had flat-out refused to leave 'Old Man Roushi' to fight Akatsuki alone. So he was deemed leader. And Killer Bee wasn't exactly happy about that. Naruto could have cared less. And he did.

"Why are we following him?" Killer Bee grumbled, averting his eyes in utter disgust. Clearly, the title of leader was invidious. To Naruto and Killer Bee, at least.

"This has 'dumbass' written all over it", Ritsuki groused, his bleak, tenebrous eyes only offering Naruto a vacant stare. "Oh, come on! Give Naruto a chance. Besides, _you've_ never been to Kiri before. _He _has_._" Shuuko admonished. She was really vouching for Naruto now if she hadn't before. "Yeah, _three_ years ago," Ritsuki grumbling, dropping the conversation, knowing that he couldn't win.

"Oh, shut it. I'll find Roushi," the only present blonde snapped back at Ritsuki. The robe-clad boy spared Naruto a sour look (and just barely looked affronted), then turned back to the path in front of them. They had been running for ten hours, nonstop. Easy for a shinobi, of course. And Shuuko hadn't even complained. He was honestly wondering if she was becoming a bit more mature...

They all stopped, almost ramming into each other's backsides in the process. The place was covered in mist-- as to be expected. "Why'd you stop?" was Gouta's simple reply. "Well, do you wanna try to see in this?!" Shuuko snapped, again vouching for Naruto. _Oh, God. She probably believes he's actually _thinking_ of something to do, _Ritsuki couldn't help but ponder, blinking a few times. In all honesty, he didn't hate Naruto, he just thought... well, Naruto clearly wasn't the brightest crayon in the box. But he was useful. Sometimes. If you asked him for an example he couldn't give you one, but he _could_ be useful.

"Roushi said he was by a lake, right?" Killer Bee broke the silence. Shuuko shook her head forcefully. "No. He said the _Sanbi_ was located in one of the great lakes," the twenty-year old supplied helpfully. "Well, it can't be too hard to find a Bijuu, right? The thing is about... well, it's big." The celadon-haired girl looked around frantically. "We should hurry up and start looking for it. We're supposed to get to it before the Akatsuki, remember?"

"Too late."

And that was all it took for Shuuko's pupils to dilate and for her to feel her knees go practically limp. The sound of an unfamiliar voice behind her. _Right_ behind her.


	46. Time And Time Again

_Forty-Six: Time And Time Again _

Kisame felt like nothing more than a sack of rice when he was flung into what seemed like millions of feet into the air by just a swipe of the Yonbi's tail alone. He was counting his lucky stars, though; if he had been taking on Itachi's Bijuu, he would have been flung about six or so kilometers off. Although he hadn't exactly lost yet, this team, his team, seemed to be epically failing. Not just _normally_ failing, _epically_ failing. He was left without _anything_ to do, just to dodge the attacks of the Yonbi-Jinchuuriki. Pitiful, if you asked him.

And that was when he hit the ground and heard a sickening _crack_, then a _crunch_. That alone made his heart race. But when he realized that it wasn't a broken limb (which was good because being impaired would have been the _worst_ thing to happen, then) his suspicions were put to rest.

Just to be brought back when his eyes finally alighted to his sword in the grasp one of three tails of the Yonbi. Great, and he could have used his sword as some kind of aegis.

The Yonbi was giving him that look again. The 'I'm-going-to-rip-you-apart' kind of look. After having seen it so many times, he wasn't as nearly as afraid as he should be. But this time, he was pretty sure the Yonbi wasn't going to look away. And there was only a slim chance that a genjutsu could flummox the demon now. If Itachi could ever get the demon to _look_ at him _or_ his eyes. Speaking of Itachi, where was the Uchiha?

Kisame gave the previous ocean a cursory once over. Itachi was staring at him out of the corner of his scarlet eyes, and his lips were moving. _A sotto voce remark? Or is he just talking to himself while looking at me? _

It was the former. Too bad Kisame couldn't make sense of it. For the being, at least. _What is he trying to say?_ Kisame decided to give up on that; well, he was kinda forced to. A chakra tail went skyrocketing through the air, and the shark-nin was forced to leap out of the way if he didn't want to get hit. (And believe me, he didn't.)

That. Hurt.

Well, at least he discovered what the earlier crack had been.

A broken rib.

The pain was still acute, but nothing else seemed to be damaged or broken (he was sure he would have felt it). With that little bit of good-bad news, the fact that he was injured was exacerbated by the fact that he was almost --_almost_-- depleted of his chakra, _and_ he was sword-less.

_Damn it! I don't know how much longer I can keep this up._

_~X~X~_

The Yonbi was like the evil devil sitting on Roushi's shoulder, across from the angel. Except, there was no angel. He was falling deeper and deeper into a situation that he couldn't get out of. At least, he couldn't get out of easily. As Roushi was doing that, the Yonbi was having a party.

**"Only one more tail to go, **_**then**_** I'll be free." **It was chanting that like some sort of mantra. In his case, it was.

Roushi could feel another surge of incipient chakra coming up. At this rate, the Yonbi would _somehow _(temporally) break its seal. And even then, Roushi didn't know what to do about that, should it happen.

**"This idiot was trying to **_**capture**_** you. He's undoubtedly strong, but if you change four-tails, we'll be able to kill him. Together." **

That was a lie. The _we _part was. He was being played like a puppet, and only the person pulling the strings could do all the work. Really, the Yonbi would be finishing Kisame off, not Roushi. But what the hell did it matter? One less Akatsuki member to worry about, right?

* * *

**_Wrong!_**

* * *

Tobi was _bored_. This entire mission was boring. Tedious, colorless, dull, mundane, stodgy, monotonous, insipid, and all those other words Tobi was too indolent --or dumb-- to think about at that moment. He was currently 'draped' (so to speak) over a cliff-like structure. Really, he was sprawled about, but draped sounded slightly cooler (to him at least).

What was taking Deidara so damn long? Sure, he wasn't that far below him; in fact, he could even _see_ Deidara. But Tobi was still left with nothing to do, and Deidara _had_ told him to stay _there_. On a threat, of course. Something along the lines of 'If you move, I'll use C3 to blast your ass to kingdom come.'

Tobi didn't exactly know what that meant (the kingdom come part, at least), but he didn't really _want_ to, either. So, he stayed put. He amused himself with picking up and dropping his mask up and down against his face. Again, he was bored, and this mission was still boring. Tedious, colorless, dull, mundane, stodgy, monotonous, insipid, and all those other words Tobi was too indolent --or dumb-- to think about.

They were supposed to be looking for a _Bijuu_, for god's sake! Bijuu were giant hulking beasts that shook the Earth just by _exhaling_. Okay, that might have been an exaggeration, but it wasn't far from the real thing. These beasts were MASSIVE (well, maybe except for the Shichibi, who was deemed the shortest). Even the Sanbi was huge; he should have been thundering around somewhere, wreaking havoc.

But nothing-- there was just mist and fog. And it seemed to be getting thicker.

"I don't have to worry about losing, Deidara-senpai," Tobi propped his back on a rock, hands behind his head. "I mean, with his hair the color of kimizu sauce, it's hard to miss."

And just like that, Deidara was gone.

* * *

That was it. Kisame was at the absolute end of his rope. He had been getting kicked around for quite some time now, _and_ his sword was in the hands --tails-- of the enemy. Maybe Itachi had taken what he said ("I'll take him down by myself, Itachi-san. You just sit back and watch.") a little too much to heart. But damn it that wasn't the point! He needed to drag his Uchiha ass over there and help him!

And the sun was setting soon. Damn, it would be hard to fight in the dark. _Wait, it shouldn't be sunset already?!_

Kisame was flattened by a tail made of raw chakra, the impact cracking a few more ribs for his troubles. So the 'sunset' had just been a Bijuu tail...

"That's it, I'm going to retreat. _Now_." _If I make it out alive in time_, is what he really wanted to say then.


	47. Retreat

_Chapter Forty-Seven: Retreat_

Kisame _hurt_, that being simply put.

He was pretty sure now that one of his ribs was broken into two or more pieces. Now that was just _perfect._ (A lot of things seemed to be going "_perfect_" in this battle.) That kind of injury could escalate to damaged internal organs or blood vessels. That didn't sound fun...

Kisame stood back up, albeit shakily. If only he could recapture his sword...

Itachi was already on it.

He had _somehow_ managed to cartwheel over the Jinchuuriki, using a 540 kick to knock the sword out of the chakra tail. _Now why didn't he do that _before_?! _Kisame growled a bit, scowling. Oh well. His sword was free was it not? Samehada collided with the ground, and Kisame hastily snagged his precious weapon of choice. The Yonbi seemed completely unperturbed by the lack of sword...

Donning his smile once more as he ignored the pain that screamed at him not to stand so straight, he let out a low chuckle. _I'm gonna have'ta thank Itachi-san for that._ Speaking of Itachi, where was he now...?

Kisame perused the former ocean for his scarlet-eyed partner, and what he saw almost made him fall over. Itachi was actually grappling with the demon! Why was he acting so rash? That was so unlike him!_ Is he trying to use genjutsu? _The shark-nin thought, unable to suppress a frown. _'Cuz that will never work... _ Regardless, Itachi was holding up incredibly against the demon.

Yonbi-Roushi reared back his head, sucking oxygen into his lungs-- a lava technique no doubt. Itachi backtracked, placing two fingers by his lips subsequent to having hastily performed a slew of hand signs.

_"Yōton: Yojin Funkazan no Jutsu!" _

_"Katon: Gōkakyu no Jutsu!"_

And just like that, everything around them instantaneously _combusted_.

Kisame, a mere shinobi proficient of Suiton element, had his mouth agape and his eyes wide. A huge explosion of lava collided straight into Itachi mega-sized fireball. Both elements clattering against each other, each trying to override the other.

So it was a battle of chakra now. _I guess I'll just sit back and watch this, _the blue-haired Akatsuki member decided, falling back a bit.

* * *

"Senpai?!... Senpai?!... Deidara-sennnnnnnnnpaiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!!!" Tobi cupped both hands over where his mouth _should_ be, to amplify his voice.

It didn't work.

"He tells me to stay put, then he just goes and gets lost." The orange-masked man slapped a hand to his concealed forehead, sighing. He looked out to the ocean, mist was still covering most, if not all, of it. "I wonder if Senpai got caught in a jutsu..."

All was quiet, save for the lapping sound of the ocean and the whispering of the wind. There were no birds, and definitely no sounds of kunai clashing. _Most_ definitely no sounds of explosions. Was Deidara lost???

"Senpai probably, likely, _most_ likely got lost somewhere in all this mist," Tobi tried to reassure himself... to no avail. He swatted at the haze, trying to scatter it a bit to see through his visible eye.

Nothing; just more mist.

That's when a horrified scream rent the air. A shrill, horrified, _girly_ scream. Mind you, Tobi knew Deidara was male, but he still had small (_really_ _small_) doubts... What was _that_?

Tobi shook his head and was about to take a step when he remembered Deidara's wonderful little threat. Sighing, he shrunk back, stepping back.

Small, soothing splashes against the water came from behind him, as he languidly took a seat on the rock he had temporarily commandeered. And, without warning, one of the Sanbi's tails crashed the water, making Tobi soar off towards the former ocean Kisame and Itachi were fighting at. Surprisingly, it wasn't very far...

* * *

Itachi backpedaled, his heels skidding across the ground, kicking up dust. He had made it out, only receiving a long rip through his cloak (above where his right acromion was located), and a bloody scratch around his upper right cheekbone.

Yonbi-Roushi had obviously won the chakra battle. Depositing his weight on his right leg, the Uchiha stepped back a bit, forming those six hand signs again. Throwing his head back, the scarlet-eyed man seethed, _Katon: Hōsenka no Jutsu!_

Multiple fireballs soared their way over to the Jinchuuriki, scattering themselves about. Itachi slumped over a bit, a firm line appearing on his face.

"Kisame," the Uchiha mumbled, "I have made you an opening. The Yonbi is now devising it's forth tail, and the other tails are no longer made of chakra." Kisame gave Itachi a quick glance, then turned to see for himself.

Sure enough, Roushi was no longer Roushi. The Jinchuuriki was now an orange demon-- feathers were fluffed out around the body, and the Yonbi's upper half seemed to be surmounted atop a snake tail! The demon was lacking pupils, and it seemed to be _hissing_ and bearing its fangs.

"So that _thing_ is a cockatrice." Kisame grinned, finally realized just _what_ the Yonbi was. Itachi gave his partner a stern warning glance, and that was all Kisame needed to force himself to make a beeline for the Yonbi at light speed.

Quicker than lighting (and so that it could only be seen in a blur), Kisame swung his sword, landing a bit behind the Yonbi. The growling Bijuu looked around, making a point to show Itachi its fangs-- as one of its limited tails fell to the ground.

The tawny-colored demon immediately threw its head back, screaming (or what Kisame could only describe as screaming) and roaring loud enough so all of _heaven_ could probably hear it.

Truth be told, the Yonbi wasn't exactly a giant, but it _was_ bigger than both Kisame and Itachi combined. It was probably taller than all of the Akatsuki piled on top of each other, but even so, Kisame still managed to chop a tail off of the demon. And that was an amazing feat in itself.

With that, the demon slowly reshaped back into a slumped over and worn-out Roushi, who was barely standing at that point. Panting, the old man took one step forward, before falling on to his face.

"He's not dead, is he?" Kisame asked airily, smiling. Itachi gave him a look that clearly stated, 'well go check, dumbass.' Kisame caught the look, slowly walking towards the fallen Jinchuuriki. "If he's dead, that might mean the Bijuu's gone too. That can't be good."

Kisame reached out with Samehada to prod the presumed dead Jinchuuriki-- that was when 55.9 kilograms collided straight on Kisame, knocking him over.

Itachi narrowed his eyes at Tobi's presence, even if Tobi _was_ apologizing profusely. "Why are you even here?" Kisame asked, despite his tone, he was still forever smiling. "I lost Deidara-senpai. And the Sanbi flung me over here."

Both Itachi and Kisame looked at each other. "The Sanbi? This close?" Roushi's ears perked up. He most definitely _wasn't_ dead. Struggling to his feet behind both Kisame and Tobi, the oldest shinobi turned on

his heels, trying to carry himself off to find the other Jinchuuriki. _They have to be around here somewhere... _

"I think Deidara-senpai got in a fight," Tobi explained, using his hands to talk. Kisame tweaked an eyebrow.

"With the Sanbi?"

Tobi shook his head furiously. "A reinforcement team."

"Hn?"

Again, Tobi cupped his hands around where his mouth should be. And before Roushi could, by some means stop him-- "DEIDARA-SENPAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WATCH OUT!!! THERE'S A REINFORCEMENT TEAM TRYING TO ATTACK YOUUUU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THEY WERE SENT BY THE OLD YONBI-JINCHUURIKI GUY! BUT HE'S DEAD NOW, YOU DON'T HAVE TO WORRY, SENPAI!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

* * *

Deidara certainly heard that. Most likely because there was only a wall of trees separating this ocean from the former one Yonbi-Roushi had decimated. Deidara wasn't the only one who heard it, though. _All_ of the reinforcement team heard it as well.

"Old man Roushi's... already--"

"Dead?!" Shuuko interjected, finishing Naruto's sentence nonetheless.

"He's not dead," Gouta reassured. (That was a laugh; he did know Roushi wasn't dead, but they had to hightail their asses right over there if they wanted to save him.) "Hurry up! We have to get to Roushi. _Now_."

Deidara had no problem with them leaving. It was his job to capture the Sanbi, anyway. But he _had_ wanted a good fight. Five Jinchuuriki against a single Akatsuki member. You could tell already who would be the victor (s), but the blonde wanted to see what would have happened regardless.

He watched the five hastily dash off, but not before Naruto shot him a dirty look.

"You were that bastard that killed Gaara."

"So you finally remember, hm."


	48. Hasty Decisions

_Chapter Forty-Eight: Hasty Decisions_

"I'll never forgive you for that," Naruto scoffed, bearing his teeth. Deidara frowned, bored, replying with, "You told me that before." Naruto spat. "What are you even doing here?" he decided it best to change the topic; he could feel Kyuubi chakra bubbling, and his blood was boiling. Maybe he could get some answers if he asked the right questions.

"Wouldn't you like to know... hm," he added the 'hm' as a last thought. And just as Naruto was about ready to bash the other blonde's face in (again), a familiar voice erupted from beyond a few trees. "DEIDARA-SENPAIIIIIIIII, WHERE ARE YOUUUUUU?! DID THE SANBI ATTACK YOUUUU???"

Said blonde could have stomped --or flew-- right over where Tobi was and throttled him then and there, had Naruto not been standing there. And surely, he had heard every word. "The Sanbi? So, you were the two sent to go get it..."

* * *

Roushi was positive that he hated Tobi as soon as he collided through the air and began screaming that he was dead. He was far from dead, but his chakra system was seriously failing him. And then, the Yonbi wasn't as confident as before...

"You need to help me; my chakra system's failing!"

"**No way! That big blue lug cut off one of my tails!" **

"You're pathetic."

"**Shut up! Great, now what are the others going to say about me..." **

"Huh? Others?"

"**Mainly Isonade." **

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"**Oh man. I can't even **_**begin **_**to think about what Youko-dono will say to me..." **

Roushi jerked his head up, shocked. "Youko? You... You don't mean--"

"**They're both here... I can just feel it..."**

"Huh?"

"**Wait! I also sense... Raijuu, Houkou, Kaku, Yamata,****and, yeah... there's Youko-dono's... chakra."**

"You mean Ritsuki, Gouta, Shuuko, Killer Bee and Naruto?"

"**Damn, they're closer than I thought." **

Roushi was lost. What the heck was the Yonbi prattling about? He seemed pretty pitiful all of a sudden... And why was he talking about 'Youko-dono'? The Kyuubi? What business did he have with him?

"**At least Nekotama's not here... She'd chew me out for sure..." **

"What are you talking about? Explain this to m--"

Roushi felt his arm bleeding. The upper part of his arm, anyway. His sleeve was cut, too. And along with all that, that had been almost the last of his chakra.

Looking up, Roushi was met with the cruel reminder that Kisame hadn't left. This time, it was his turn to let the 'I'm going to rip you apart' look shine on his face.

"Did you forget that I'm still here?"

Roushi's eyes fluttered down to Kisame's annoyingly chronic grin that kept showing up on his face. "How could I forget about you?" He elicited an indignant, albeit forced grin.

He was about ready to slap that grin (a bit too literally) smirk of Kisame's face. But with the finite amount of chakra he had, he couldn't even manage that much.

"Hey, Itachi! I think he's still got a little fight left in him..." Kisame taunted; obviously the situation was quite the opposite.

Roushi, now 'relaxed' --or as much as a man staring death in the face could get-- into sitting on his haunches, began going over his options. _One: I could just die. Two: I could try to 'coax' the Yonbi into letting me borrow his chakra. Or three: I could-- _"Old Man Roushi!"

"_--wait for them to save me..._"

The maroon-haired man jerked his head up so fast that he was surprised he wasn't dizzy. With burgundy hair falling into his eyes, Roushi turned towards the group where his voice had been called.

No one was there.

_Well that killed off choice three. I could have sworn I heard Shuuko's voice... Maybe I'm growing delusional... _

_~X~X~ _

Kisame was confused, simply as that. The Jinchuuriki was just staring out in to space, and he had his life in his hands. What the hell was he thinking at a time like this?!

The ex-Kiri-nin dared to nudge Roushi, just barely, though. He received a glare for his troubles. And then a fairly hard smack across the face to boot.

Of course, Roushi was really only going on his promise of not being one to lose this battle. At least, not without getting _some_ information.


	49. Weak Spot

_Chapter Forty-Nine: Weak Spot _

The Sharingan must be taking its toll, right? It had to be. But on the other hand, Itachi hadn't been fighting as long as Kisame had. He also hadn't landed a direct hit with _Tsukuyomi_ or _Amaterasu_. The maroon-haired man jerked upwards, dodging another attack from Samehada and leapt back a few paces, even though it hurt like hell to move. He relaxed once he froze, crouched over in the same position he had just been in.

So what were his options? Die? Keep fighting? Attack Kisame who wasn't in the at full strength anyway? It was common shinobi knowledge to attack the weakest opponent, but how often did that opponent have a huge-ass zanbatō that could _absorb_ chakra? Especially since he was practically chakra-depleted himself. And Itachi was practically at full-strength.

Roushi finally understood why the Akatsuki operated the way they did. Jinchuuriki were usually outcasts, loners, and orphans. With _two_ Akatsuki-nin --who had awesome abilities to boot-- sent to capture _one_ Jinchuuriki, the odds were against the Jinchuuriki. But... if the Jinchuuriki used Bijuu for help that seemed to act like a two-man cell as well. If the Bijuu complied, but why wouldn't it?

Oh right, it was too busy cowering in fear about the sudden so-called appearance of Youko-dono. Roushi continued pondering about just what the Yonbi had been talking about. And then he fixed his mind on just what he knew about the Kyuubi, or 'Youko-dono'.

The nine-tailed demon was an enemy of the Sharingan. It had fallen to that exact doujutsu so many years ago. Because of that fact, is that why the Akatsuki sent Itachi of all people to capture the demon?

* * *

"How close is Roushi?"

"Pretty close."

"Are you just saying that?"

"Yes."

"No!"

Killer Bee shot Ritsuki a venomous glare. "Oh, and you know where he is?" the Kumo-nin groused vindictively. Ritsuki shot his black eyes at him and replied with a simple "I never said I knew were Roushi was. Hell, I don't even know where Naruto is anymore..."

That caught everyone's attention. Apparently, no one had noticed Naruto's absence for quite some time. "Where _did_ Naruto run off to?" Shuuko said, her voice half above a whisper. Her reply was the turbulent shaking of the ground, and a scream of _Kuchiyose no Jutsu_ from beyond a few trees. The area where they had just come from.

"Okay... what was that?"

Gouta shrugged. "It sounded like Naruto..."

* * *

"That's new, hm," Deidara looked at the sudden gargantuan toad that stood there, complete with slippery cyan skin, and two daggers attached to its back.

"This one's named Gamahiro," Naruto shouted, backing up a bit on Gamahiro's back. Gamahiro, one of Jiraiya's summons, was about as big as Gamabunta. But the Sanbi seemed about that big as well.

Grabbing with webbed hands at both of the swords, Gamahiro slashed at the flimsy bird of clay Deidara was riding on, just barely missing. "You're going to have to be faster than that, hm," Deidara mocked, swerving quickly to dodge another attempt of killing off his only transportation.

His eyes fell on his hand, the mouth was chewing rapidly. _Almost done... _Naruto's eyes alighted to Deidara's figure. He had his arms back... Then, his brain began calculating, dragging and dusting off all of the information he used to know about the bomber.

_He works with clay; he travels on his own creations; he's a long-range fighter; he uses explosives-- _

"Katsu!"

Next thing Naruto knew, he was free-falling off his current position on the toad's head. "_Kage Bushin no Jutsu!_" Using the clones to fling himself into the air back onto his position on Gamahiro's back, he was once again met with the noise of an explosion ringing through his ears.

* * *

Roushi was steadily regaining his chakra. He was now able to complete two successful mega-sized lava balls. But that was all he could manage. He was _forced _to use one when Kisame came charging at him, laughing maniacally and swinging that blasted sword at him.

That one was met with a simple water ball in response. No surprise. One more shot and that was it. He had to make it count.

It was rather hard to concentrate, though, when Itachi's red eyes were watching his every move. Was he copying the technique?

He'd have to trick him, then. But how do you trick an all-seeing eye? Doing something to the eye, of course. Preferably gouging it out.

The maroon-haired man reared back, his fingers displaying the last hand seal. "_Yōton: Yougan no Jutsu!_" Itachi got caught in the smoke, and Roushi rushed in, kunai ready.

The blade met flesh, and it was dragged upwards, most likely, hopefully, making Itachi bleed. _Gotcha! _He had got him. And with his last lavaball as well--

A heavy weight hit Roushi's head, and he could feel the warm blood draining down his brow and forehead. Things were going black and fuzzy, he was tottering, a voice was calling his name.

"_Roushi? Roushi?! Shit, what the hell happened?!_"

Maybe he was hallucinating again. Or maybe his old age was taking over. It _was _his birthday, and he _was_ fifty-four. Today. Right now. It was still his birthday. He was getting too old for this, but now, at least he didn't have to do it anymore.

* * *

**A/N: Elemental Dragon Swordman pointed out I've just passed 100 reviews by a bit. Thank you everyone for reading, reviewing, and favoriting!! (That's not a word is it...?) **


	50. Too Late

_Chapter Fifty: Too Late_

"Roushi's chakra's fading. I'm beginning to not be able to sense him anymore," Gouta informed the others as they ran. Shuuko bit her lip before turning towards Killer Bee. "What does the Hachibi say?" And Killer Bee frowned a bit. "You mean Hachibi-sama?" Shuuko and Gouta exchanged irritated glances before turning back to Killer Bee. "Same thing."

The Kumo-nin huffed. "Not even close to being--" "Will you just tell us what the hell 'Hachibi-sama' says. _Please_?" Ritsuki interrupted, growled a bit as he rolled his eyes. For that, he got a glare from Killer Bee, but his sunglasses prevented Ritsuki for getting the full brunt of the non-verbal threat. With a cross of his arms, Killer Bee airily grounded out that Roushi was probably dying as they spoke.

"What?!"

"Yeah, he's probably keeling over right now. It's probably about time for him to kick the bucket now, isn't it?"

Shuuko could have slapped him.

"How can you say such a thing?! Roushi will be fine... if we can find him."

"Maybe Naruto found him," Gouta suggested, trying and failing to ease everyone's frazzled and frayed nerves. It didn't work; all and sundry was pitifully caught up in the epinephrine rush. "No, Naruto's chakra is coming from behind us, Roushi's is somewhere ahead," Killer Bee stated, jotting a few words in his journal as he ran.

Everyone soon heard a raucous guffaw, only about a kilometer ahead-- no, just half a kilometer ahead. "That sounded like Kisame..." Everything lapsed into silence, various thoughts racing through their minds as that began to wonder why Kisame would be laughing. "Well, when I first saw him, he did seem a bit too cheerful for his own good." Killer Bee placed a hand on his chin to muse further.

"Roushi's the only one who's really had millions upon millions of run-ins with this Kisame guy. One when we first met him, two in the sewer, and again right now. I've only seen him in the Bingo Book," the celadon-haired girl reported, biting her lip. She remembered what Kisame looked like: he was a _giant_, plain and simple. Then, he had those teeth (fangs) and that petrifying sword. To top it all off, he was an Akatsuki member, and that fact in itself usually sent shinobi of all ranks and statuses falling to their knees. Except for maybe a Kage...

He was a member of the Seven Swordsmen of Kirigakure, and a former resident of the village itself. He had been held accountable for several assassinations and his attempt to overthrow the government. So he was most likely on Kiri's most wanted.

Okay, now she was scared. And hadn't Roushi written something about Uchiha Itachi being there as well? She didn't know Itachi very well. Hell, she barely even know much about the entire Uchiha clan.

But from what Naruto's numerous tales about his life, he was Sasuke Uchiha's brother. Even so, she still didn't know much about Sasuke, despite how many times Naruto seemed to mention him.

What she did know, though, was that the Uchiha clan's prized kekkei genkai was a doujutsu called the Sharingan. They were masters of genjutsu, and it was said that the Sharingan could see through chakra. Said doujutsu had been birthed from another Konoha clan's kekkei genkai, named the _Byakugan_. Members of the Hyuuga clan possessed those special eyes.

As Shuuko continued going over all the information she had so far, the other four were chatting amongst themselves.

"Roushi's dying. He's not going to make it," Gouta announced half-sorrowful, half-solemnly, letting his sentences sink in. Shuuko snapped away from her thoughts, jerking her head towards Gouta and ending up with one of her long bangs in her mouth.

"Then we need to pick up the pace and save him!" With that little 'parting gift' Shuuko sped up, dashing faster and almost becoming out of sight to her friends who were still behind her.

Each step, though, her wishes were slowly dying away, and excitement and hope were slowly and surely ebbing out of her system.

Her rushed footsteps slowed down drastically, and the already-fleeting water ripples began disappearing, just a tad bit slower as the kunoichi lingered. She felt her heart stop for just a moment as she watched the fabric of three Akatsuki coats swish and flap in the wind.

Crimson eyes eased upwards to see Roushi surmounting Samehada. His eyes were closed, he looked rumpled, and he was bleeding, but not heavily. And he was just laying there like a trophy.

That's when fear and sudden realization (with a tad of shinobi instinct) set in. Her footsteps picked up drastically as she hurried to catch up and stop the men who were taking Roushi.

But it was too late to do anything of worth. What would she do, anyway? Fight three-on-one for a half-dead body? No! Roushi wasn't dead. She refused to believe what Killer Bee and Gouta had told her.

She knew they were right.

It was too late. Running at breakneck speed, Shuuko opened her mouth to scream. "H--"

The Sanbi, shrouded in the mist erupted behind her, breaking the entire wall of trees down before it.

After letting her eyes widen, she slowly turned, her eyes drinking up the sight of Naruto atop a humongous toad, blood dribbling from the right side of his mouth.

Not too far away from the blonde was another, she just barely recognized. He was standing on one of his clay birds, fluttering sedately up and down as he stared expressionlessly ahead, his collar covering his mouth.

The lone kunoichi's mouth gently fell open a bit, her eyes widened in amazement at the sight of either another Akatsuki-nin, the toad, the Sanbi, or a mix of the three.

Breaking the silence completely --and also breaking Shuuko out of her silent shock-- the Sanbi roared.

At that moment, Ritsuki, Killer Bee, and Gouta decided to appear.

So, it was going to be a four-on-four battle.


	51. The Discussion of Earth vs Water

_Chapter Fifty-One: The Discussion of Earth vs Water _

**A/N:**** Forgive me, I've realized that I cannot count. Last chapter, I said that the Jinchuuriki and the present Akatsuki members would be fighting four-on-four. Something in my head told me that something wasn't right, but I had no clue what. Later on, while writing this chapter, I realized there are indeed**_** five**_** Jinchuuriki alive and present and only **_**four**_** Akatsuki-nin here. Please forgive me for the screw up!**

* * *

Killer Bee first noticed Samehada being surmounted by Roushi. Then he noticed Itachi, then Tobi, then Naruto, and then Deidara also came into focus. The Sanbi was the last one who flooded into his vision. And to be completely truthful, the sight of the Sanbi was the most frightening of all the 'company'. "What... is going on here?"

Shuuko was already lost in space, complete with her scarlet eyes widened and her mouth still agape. She just sat there, allowing celadon streaks of hair and salty water droplets to hit her cheeks and cheekbones. What was she so surprised about? Naruto sprung into the air, using momentum as well as chakra to further his journey and his altitude. He landed atop the waters in between Ritsuki and Shuuko.

"They're after the Sanbi," he informed them expressionlessly. "It's going to be _somewhat_ of a four-on-four battle, then," Gouta said, eyeing Roushi. He looked like a caught animal, still as stone, face expressionless. Well, more like a caught and dead animal now, but still. "He's not dead."

"Then why don't we go over there and take him back from those thugs?!" Shuuko exclaimed, finally animated again. "Calm down--" "He's being carried like a trophy; that's just wrong!" the kunoichi interrupted the twenty-year-old. She was practically panicking. If Roushi, the smartest and oldest Jinchuuriki amongst them all, was being taken away from them, there'd be only five Jinchuuriki left with about ten Akatsuki members to capture them. The odds were just plain sickening now.

"Let's go over what we know about the guys in front of us. We'll each fight each of them one--" "I want the explosive one!"

Six eyes turned towards Naruto and Ritsuki. "I'm taking him!"

"No, I am!"

"I've already fought him, so I know his skills," Naruto reasoned.

"I've fought him as well," Ritsuki countered effortlessly.

That threw poor Naruto through a loop. "When?"

"In the sewers," came the black-haired shinobi's curtly response. "You weren't there, remember?"

"Still, I've fought him twice. Remember when I said Kakashi-sensei and I were trying to get back Gaara?"

"You had help; I handled this guy single-handedly. Besides, you _still_ didn't defeat and/or kill him."

"I was fighting him just now! Besides, if you were such a great shinobi, you would have finished him off by now as well!" Naruto shot back.

"I bet you don't even know his name!"

"His name doesn't matter, as long as I kick his butt!"

"True..."

It was a wonder to Shuuko how their opponents were just sitting there, quiet. "Anyway, you must not know your elements well enough," Naruto haughtily replied, a tinge of pride attached to his voice. "Earth is stronger than water element." Shuuko noticed that Ritsuki's visible eye widened a fraction. In fact, the movement was so small, only a superior shinobi would have recognized it anyway. (Shuuko was an exception.)

"If so, then we'd be better off letting Shuuko or Killer Bee fight him," Gouta broke into the conversation, "preferably Killer Bee."

"Why's that?" Shuuko asked, turning to Gouta. "Because lighting element--" "Kicks earth's ass !" Killer Bee broke in, grinning like a maniac. "Then it's settled," Ritsuki stepped forward, smirking. "I'm taking him."

Naruto was again thrown through a loop. "What do you mean _you're_ taking him?! Gouta said lighting element is stronger than earth, you have water element! And that's _weaker_ than earth!" Ritsuki's smirk stayed stock-still on his face, though. "Then you must not know what element the Rokubi utilizes, do you?"

Naruto's mouth dropped open slightly at that. Of course he hadn't expected something like _that_... "But how are you going to get up there?" Naruto asked more gently, his voice a lot lower. He was still only _slightly_ unconvinced. Ritsuki cocked his head to the side, having black hair fall over his nose and slightly into his other eye. "Nothing a few bubbles can't fix. Bubbles levitate into the air, you know. Besides, didn't you want to talk to the Uchiha about something?" Ritsuki replied before Naruto could even speak again. It took a few seconds to register, but Naruto eventually broke into a million smiles before nodding in agreement. That seemed to be just what he needed to put all his trust in Ritsuki.

"Kick his ass, then."

Even Ritsuki managed to smirk at that, a smirk that looked just like Sasuke's. "I'm taking Itachi," was all Naruto said before taking a step. "Wind makes a fire bigger--" "That's not going to stop me!" Naruto interrupted Killer Bee. Gouta turned back around, continuing to assign everyone their opponent.

"Then there's Kisame, and the one in the mask. I'll help Naruto with Itachi, since his genjutsu will get in the way. Killer Bee, you go with Kisame." Then his eyes fell on Tobi. What on earth could _he_ do?

Gouta's voice dropped dangerously. "We're still in the dark about his abilities," Gouta said, staring directly at Tobi. "Shuuko, you can take him, but be careful." Shuuko studied Tobi for a bit, then hesitated briefly before nodding. "But... what the hell can he _do_? I've never seen him do anything. He's always with..." She paused to look up at Deidara-- and he stared right back at her. Taken a bit aback by that drilling, unbreakable, blue-eyed stare, Shuuko gasped ever so slightly, looking back at Gouta's back.

"I-I'll try..." she breathed, steeling herself for a fight she might as well die in. It's not good to just step right into a battle, unprepared and not knowing what an opponent had ready to kill you with. That didn't stop other shinobi --kunoichi, likewise-- from doing such, right? This was an Akatsuki member, though, and there were already tremors emitting from her body. She also felt slightly pale.

Boy was she in for a surprise.


	52. Of Zigzags and Red Eyes

_Chapter Fifty-Two: Of Zigzags and Red Eyes _

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Shuuko was nonplussed. She simply stood there for a few seconds, unsure if she should be chasing that masked man or doing something else. She decided to chase him. What else _could_ she do, anyway?

Tobi, though... "AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" was pretty self-explanatory for what _he_ was doing. He was running for all he was worth, flailing his arms and running in furious zigzags.

After hearing the abrupt scream erupt from below, Deidara turned slightly, gliding his one-eyed vision to map out Tobi's meandering path. "What the hell are you doing, idiot?!" Though he'd never admit it aloud, he was curious as to what Tobi would actually _do_. Hopefully it wouldn't be just useless running and screaming.

Tobi was too busy to save his own skin from Shuuko's unsheathed and unknown techniques to pay attention. He dashed --without a single second thought-- right into the fog.

Shuuko, who wasn't too far away, looked up, her scarlet eyes augmented as she caught sight of Tobi running into the mist. Great; that just made this battle _that _much more difficult. She cautiously jogged over to the fog, looking at every inch around her. The oneiric mist found its way to her mind, and although she couldn't believe it, she actually started to drift off a bit.

_~X~X~_

"Alright, I want some answers," Naruto ground out, fist clenched, eyes blazing straight ahead. "Where the hell is Sasuke?!"

Itachi stared levelly back. In fact, he had the audacity to look bored-- no, _tired_, with Naruto screaming at his face. But wasn't that the way Uchiha Itachi always looked? Stoic, voiceless, impassive, taciturn, and secretive? At least, from all Naruto had seen of him, there was always a check mark by all of those characteristics.

"Why would I know something like that?" Itachi mouthed cooly, accidentally riling Naruto further. "You know how to track _us_ down, so why wouldn't you be able to stalk Sasuke as well?!" He had a point...

"I wouldn't call it _stalking_, Naruto," Gouta broke in, placing a hand on Naruto's shoulder, trying --and failing-- to restrain him a little. _We're like animals being stalked for food!_ Naruto thought bitterly. The blonde rarely thought things like that-- a telltale sign that something was wrong.

"Well, good luck with them, Itachi-san," Kisame grinned, chuckling as he suppressed the urge to slap his partner on the back. Itachi straightened just a bit, letting his black eyes bleed slowly to red, save for his onyx pupils.

"You should worry about yourself, Kisame. You are the one who is moderately injured."

Killer Bee perked up.

"These guy'll be nothing," Kisame unsheathed Samehada, grinning menacingly. Killer Bee sat still, the only movement being the unsheathing of one of his own swords. Gouta took his eyes away from Naruto for a split second. "Be careful--" "Attack his ribs."

Killer Bee went with the second option. Of course he didn't bother asking the Hachibi where he had gotten this tidbit from. Nobody ever questioned Hachibi-sama.

He simply nodded, leaping off, and leaving Itachi to peruse them completely with his Sharingan.


	53. Forest Fire

_Chapter Fifty-Three: Forest Fire _

Deidara threw up a few bombs, and with the swift movement of two fingers and a "Katsu!", the bombs simultaneously exploded. Flamboyant sparks and swirls filled the air, seconds before the smoke started setting in. Ritsuki could smell the explosion. Nothing short of a few C1 bombs. His pale yellow bubble pipe was yanked from the flaps of his blue robe in a few sparse seconds, and soon, Ritsuki was also floating upwards on bubble, using only raw chakra to stay on.

_Now... what do I do? _Ritsuki narrowed his eyes, blowing meaningless bubbles from the pipe. _He's just sitting there, hm... _The explosive artist had turned his head to stare. Tobi was pretty much the least of his worries at the moment.

Blue eyes shifted downwards. _Almost ready. _The blonde resisted the urge of clenching his fist. The strange oddity on his palm continued chewing, finally upchucking a chewed, off-white lump. The artist quickly tightened his fingers around the glob, grinning maliciously as if his fingers were gripping someone's neck rather than a lump of higher-leveled mud. After lifting his arm once more, and throwing the clay haphazardly, he lifted two fingers again, but this time no words emitted from his mouth.

The assorted creations exploding on cue, each of them positioned exactly around Ritsuki. You think he'd learn after having to fight this guy once...

Lucky for Ritsuki, he hadn't lost control of his little --more like big-- bubble. Yet. Stifling a cough, Ritsuki shut his eyes, thinking, _I have absolutely no idea in hell as to how to control this demon. Whatever; I'm trying to do damage, so what's wrong with letting it go wild anyway? _

_That_ was all it took for the Rokubi to perk its ears and let lighting-element chakra begin spreading through Ritsuki's chakra system like forest fire. Of course, Ritsuki had no idea which type of lighting jutsu would do the trick, and then he had to get close enough to Deidara to actually go through with the technique.

He rose the bubble higher, zooming out of the way of an oncoming spider.

_Alright, then. _He formed a few seals, finally deciding which jutsu to use. The crackling of lighting filled his ears, and Deidara turned partially around to look. Lighting replaced Ritsuki's entire right hand as he stood up. He leapt off the bubble, aiming at the bird's tail feather with his newly upgraded body part.

Of course, any shinobi worth his salt would have swerved out of the way of the oncoming attack. As predicted, Deidara moved the body of clay out of the way, but all that did was allow his opponent to extend the lighting into some sort of sword.

_~X~X~_

"What's our strategy?" Gouta murmured, lowering his head. "I say we charge him. I'll hit him with Rasengan and--" "You really want to start out with something like _that_?"

Naruto glared at Gouta's interruption. "What's wrong with that? Besides, wasn't it _you_ asked what our strategy was...?"

Gouta shook his head softly. "He can read lips with that Sharingan, remember that." Naruto clenched his fist; they were wasting time. "Then what do you want to do?! Get some distance, _then_ talk about what we're gonna do?!"

The older shinobi looked up at Itachi. He was just sitting there, completely still, expressionless, staring. "He looks like a stone..." Naruto grumbled, earning a gentle spike in the ribs.

Naruto looked back up towards the Uchiha. He looked at the Sharingan, every detail. He finally decided Itachi was probably waiting for them to make the first move. "Alright, we have the advantage," he whispered hoarsely at Gouta. "He's not doing anything, so I'll use my Rasengan on him." Gouta sighed. Was he not getting through or was he not getting through? "Naruto, why are you going to start with using the Rasengan--?" He was cut off when he saw Naruto smirking at him.

"Because you're going to attack from behind. Everyone knows what to do in a 2-on-1 fight against Sharingan."

* * *

**Newly Acquired Jinchuuriki Info:**

**The actual names of the other Jinchuuriki were released a while ago. Along with that, the actual animals that the Bijuu are were released:**

1st Jinchuuriki- Gaara

2nd Jinchuuriki- Nii Yugito

3rd Jinchuuriki- Yagura

4rd Jinchuuriki- Roushi (alternate Rōshi)

5th Jinchuuriki- Han

6th Jinchuuriki- Utakata (actually from Kirigakure)

7th Jinchuuriki- Fuu

8th Jinchuuriki- Killer Bee

9th Jinchuuriki- Uzumaki Naruto

1st Bijuu- Tanuki (Ichibi)

2nd Bijuu- Cat (Nibi)

3rd Bijuu- Turtle (Sanbi)

4th Bijuu- Ape (Yonbi)

5th Bijuu- Dolphin Horse (Gobi)

6th Bijuu- Gastropod (or slug) (Rokubi)

7th Bijuu- Rhino Beetle (Shichibi) (called Nanabi)

8th Bijuu- Ushi-oni (Hachibi)

9th Bijuu- Fox (Kyuubi)

**I'll still be using the names and Bijuu I assigned the characters in the beginning, only to prevent confusion.** ^^


	54. Mistakes

_Chapter Fifty-Four: Mistakes _

"_Genjutsu_...?" Scarlet eyes flickered open and shut slowly. Everything was beginning to look incredibly fuzzy for Shuuko. The trees were becoming a blur and the small pebbles and gravel were making her vision even more blurry still.

"Where... is... he?" She took a step, glancing around at all of the sitting mist and fog.

Unbeknownst to her, Tobi was hiding behind a mere rock.

_~X~X~_

_What is that? _Deidara's mouth fell open at seeing the streaking lightning rip across the sky. He looked down at Ritsuki with a glare. What the hell was he up to now? Some kind of sword made of raw lightning was hovering in front of him. And it was _huge_.

It'd be easiest to sever one of the wings, and down the bomber would go...

At least, that was _easy_ way things would be done. Deidara was a prodigy, so he most-likely wouldn't fall for anything like that. How about two swords then? Using more _Raiton_ chakra, the sword transfigured into another blade, just connected at the same hilt.

Now this was getting a bit easier.

The Iwa-nin swerved, forcing the bird to increase their altitude and fly higher. This wasn't good. He couldn't bring the battle up too high or he'd get dizzy. He'd probably also suffer something like soroche if he went any higher...

Instead, he ducked the bird to the side, avoiding yet another strike of lightning. He was at a great disadvantage. Not only was _Raiton_ stronger than _Doton_, but this lightning could extend as long as Ritsuki wanted it to be, though it required more chakra each time.

The Rokubi extended one of the sword's blades again, slicing fiercely at the bird. "Shit!" The Iwa-nin was forced to jerk further to the right, but the other blade was slicing on his right side, too ,with Ritsuki below them both. He was forced to increase his altitude again. But luckily, he wasn't feeling dizzy just yet.

Though Ritsuki was.

_~X~X~_

Killer Bee swung hard at Kisame, almost succeeding in knocking him in the face. The Kiri-nin's reaction time was getting slower.

Killer Bee voiced that fact, just to receive a not-so-nice look from Kisame. He, in turn, grabbed Samehada and swung fiercely, over and over at the other male.

_~X~X~ _

"Two-on-one?" Gouta repeated, turning his brown eyes to the blonde next to him. Naruto nodded furiously. "Right! You'll attack from behind... and I'll attack from the front."

Itachi narrowed his eyes a bit, reading their lips. He switched his Sharingan off for a while. He knew he shouldn't have, but he could feel his head begin to spin a bit. Lifting his hands, he decided to size them up with a fire jutsu.

"_Katon: Hōsenka no Jutsu!" _


End file.
